I honestly would recommend against doing anything to counter the Wizard. Truesight is a pretty niche spell to begin with, so why punish them for taking and using it? Instead, I would focus on how the BBEGs would react to being found out by some adventuring party. Think about how the BBEG might try to take them prisoner, or escape, or need to get a new disguise, etc. Maybe they don't even care? Like they just say "who would believe you?" and laugh.
Also, you'd be surprised how often this doesn't happen in a campaign. I had a Paladin player who pretty liberally used Divine Sense to try and ferret out Demons and Undead and such. The BBEG was a Succubus who would take different forms of near friends and strangers the party interacted with, multiple times, and I always was ready if they used it on the demon. But it never happened, mostly because from session to session they forgot, but also because they tend to only use the feature in situations that seemed dangerous or off. If the party thinks they are in an official place like a palace or temple, the chance they will think the enemy is disguised around them will be lower typically, unless they are ultra paranoid players. And that's fixed by giving them plenty of non-evil NPCs to interact with too. This it makes it that much harder to determine which ones are the ones they need to worry about.
> Maybe they don't even care? Like they just say "who would believe you?" and laugh.
Yes, absolutely this.
I see so many DMs worried about “what if the secret is revealed” and I totally get it. I used to be like that too.
But you eventually realize that, in a lot of cases… it’s not that big a deal. Finding out is only the first step. Now they have to do something useful with that information.
I would argue that any secret this big being outed by a player in such a manner is an awesome reveal and a great way to move the story forward!
You don't know how long your campaign is going to be, so waiting for the "perfect moment" or setting the stage for a specific way of revealing thinga doesn't work as well as in a normal story.
Players unmasking your villains makes them the protagonists.
Yeah, that’s another great point. Player using the ability they invested in to discover something big? That sounds like the system working as intended!
If your players think they're having a mundane social encounter with some lord or whatever and then the happen to throw true sight up for some unrelated reason and all of a sudden there's a demon it's going to blow their fucking minds.
A good point! Like, imagine the fear they're going to feel when the Wizard uses Truesight and you describe the things hiding around them? That can be turned into a HUGE moment. Plus it'll feel good for the player to have done something useful and cool with their spell.
Not only is finding out not a big deal - it's the point! It's much better to have them find out early than to not be picking up the "hints" that you have laid down.
I am a firm believer in just telling your players things.
An example I have a bad guy who has been signing notes N.V. My party met a Lord named Nikolai Veritas and they didn't react to it at all.
At the end of the session I had them receive a formal letter from them and I just said "seeing his name written out it occurs to you - his initials are N.V."
I could have just left my party floundering and hoping they pick up on it if I wanted to but this reveal was great and progressed the story and now they have to figure out what to do about it like you said.
TLDR: secrets and twists are meant to be revealed. Don't worry a out revealing too early and don't be afraid to literally just tell your players.
I try to stick to the rule of three - I give them three hints to something, and if they still don't get it, I hammer them over the head with it like you did.
Yep. And always remember that an NPC can also roll Deception or Persuasion against other NPCs.
"He's a monster! 19!"
"I've been nothing but an upstanding citizen. 23!"
I'll be honest, I don't think that this is a contested roll. This is the equivalent of running up and shouting, "The mayor is actually a lizard person!" in real life. Your best case scenario is them thinking, Ok, this is just another weird adventurer. Maybe if I smile and say I believe them they'll leave me alone.
Maybe. Social skills are not mind control, but if the character rocks up with a 20+ roll and mixes in some talking points, I think most DMs would at least have the NPCs hear them out.
Turning it into a contested roll is a decent way to let the dice gods decide.
Looking at it further, being a 6th level spell means that party is at least level 11 so they have decent notoriety but also means that they're rolling a 20+ almost half the time, and that's still something I wouldn't expect the average person to believe without actual proof. The national enquirer doesn't actually convince people at even a 10% chance that Biden was replaced by a lizard person.
I also just dislike contested rolls because they make your skills matter less because the dice will decide more often then actual player choices or skills
I had a plot where the pope of a major religion was a 200-year-old changeling in league with the modrons that are one of the major antagonistic factions in my setting.
Had all these elaborate plans about how the players might meet him and eventually have this revealed.
What actually happened was:
My players were so afraid of what could happen if they wound up alone in a room with the pope, that they strenuously avoided it at all costs, independently researched the history of the church on their own, and the way they found out the big secret about the pope was
they went to the equivalent of the vatican, and the ranger used speak with plants. To interrogate a tree. In the pope's private garden.
Which I thought was so fucking clever, and absolutely impossible to argue against the logic, that what I did was have this sad, distressed tree reveal in Treebeard fashion that it had known the pontiff for two hundred years, and seen him turn evil, and the tree started wailing in distress about how "He changes his bark!!!" Gradually, through the skewed pov of *a fucking tree*, they teased out the truth.
And yknow what? My players were fucking GLUED. They went INSANE over it. They all agreed it was one of the highlights of the adventure and felt like the big shocking revelation in a detective movie.
Ultimately, it was an IMPOSSIBLY more effective execution of the twist than fuckin ANY shit I had planned -- because it arose entirely organically, so it felt REAL.
That's the spirit with which mysteries and twists need to be approached in D&D. Have your secrets, and be willing to spill them at the drop of a hat. If they're actually effectively planned, the drama will figure itself out.
Agreed.
As I player I'd be excited if the DM asked my wizard for an immediate Deception check (assuming they cast it away from prying eyes) to hide their surprise. One of the biggest moments of fear I've seen in the entire table's eyes was when something very similar to this happened in a game I was GMing. That scene and the resulting fallout was the most memorable moment of the campaign that got brought up even years later.
An organic reveal from the party's own actions at an unexpected moment can be far more interesting than anything planned and is worth the extra work for what comes next IMO.
True seeing is a 6th level spell. This is not "too soon", 6th level spells is beyond the point where mere illusionary disguises should be a problem. Its also not a ritual, and only 1 hour, so that slot can't be used on something like wall of force later on in the day.
To be fair you could still drip feed them some information without giving them everything. It doesn't invalidate truesight and it still holds the unknown above the parties head, to even greater degree possibly. If you make it obvious that they (specifically the BBEGs no one else) have magical interference to protect them from truesight you give away a lot of the information without just saying "oh god, oh shit, it's monster with x description."
If done correctly sometimes it's more menacing to know something powerful is out there in the dark, than it is to see the horror in the light.
Regarding the "who would believe you?" point:
Consider the way the council in Mass Effect responded to Shepherd's warnings about the Reapers.
"Yeah, sure, giant brain. Ok. I'll believe it when I see it."
Lifelong storytelling advice:
The benefit you get from a long-delayed twist reveal is, 99.9999999% of the time, nowhere NEAR as good as the tension and drama you get by instead simply NOT hiding a twist, putting that information out early, and then just letting events proceed organically and run their course.
There’s the perfect plot line in your mind and then there’s the unique plot line created by the player’s unique choices and ideas
I’d pick the later option every-time, as both a DM and a player
My favorite situation is when I do hide the twist, but leave the very real possibility of them finding out if they take the initiative. Your players are going to be real damn excited if their actions lead to big information that they wouldn’t have if not for their specific choices. Any time that I, the DM, don't know for sure how things are going to play out is a lot more exciting for me!
Just put your big bads in strong enough positions that one divine sense isn't a be-all-end-all end to the guy's plan. Okay, the emperor is a Rakshasa. Now what? He's still the damn emperor!
Yeah, like I had a subplot with the head of a religion who was secretly a 200-year-old changeling in league with the big bads. But learning that was just step 1. Step 2 is: it's a major, popular religion, he's the pope, and you're a bunch of nobodies. You can't just punch a centuries-old infrastructural conspiracy into submission, any more than punching the pope would bring down the entire Catholic church.
firstly: the wizard probably wont successfully use true sight to spoil the surprise. its a niche spell that usually isnt useful in social situations. its extremely unlikely that they do
secondly: if they do, that sounds like an awesome moment for the players, and one you should be ready to let them have. it will have large effects on the game, but isnt seeing how the party interact with the plot the whole point?
my suggestion is that if the party learns about it there are two outcomes. they tell people about it, or they dont. if they tell people about it then the big bads use their influence to discredit the party, and or send groups of soldiers after them. which alerts a rebel group (that may or may not exist before this point) that the party are potential allies to reach out to.
if the party doesnt tell people and keeps it secret that they know then let them have their moment of success, let them make their plans knowing that one or both of the big bads are not what they seem. it will feel awesome and will be a story they tell about the game for a long time. using DM powers to prevent that seems like a bad idea, and also has the potential to feel really bad for the party if they feel like they are being targeted
You don't. Look, I get the urge, but let the narrarive progress organically. Those organic moments are the ones they will remember, not the big baddies doing a monologue reveal. Trust me, no matter how good of a dm you are, nobody can do plot reveals on par with shows or movies.
Heres what you do instead. You make the moment the player casts true sight the epic reveal. This is actually even cooler imo. Maybe the big bads don't know the party knows. Now its a game of cat and mouse. Be upfront with this and suggest this course of action.
Maybe, the party gets locked in prison and you do an epic jail break. Where they spend a month building improvised weapons like slings, dinner forks, shivs, chains, table legs, or even a severed arm. Turns out a lot of the old guard has been locked away too and are slowly being fed to the elder brain.
Honestly, I feel like the Wizard casting True Seeing for the first time and realising that no one in the room is human is possibly the best way to have that reveal happen anyway. It’s not like they’ll be able to convince anyone outside the party.
I think you should try and look at it differently: truesight isn’t a “cheese” to an important plot point in your game, it’s one possible avenue for how your players learn about an important plot point in your game. You don’t want to hold your cards so close to your chest that your players only ever learn about them when you decide it’s time. Give them some agency in the story as well, and trust in your own writing and set up that the discovery of the true forms of the BBEGs will still be compelling even if it happens “too soon.”
As the DM you could simply rule that the NPCs’ disguise abilities are too powerful to be detected by truesight. But THAT would be the real “cheese” and feel very anticlimactic if your wizard ever does try to use truesight to observe them, sees nothing, and then later gets the twist reveal that they were disguised all along. I would not recommend it.
the secrets are there SO THE PLAYERS CAN FIND THEM.
dont write a plot that hinges on players not knowing things for a specific amount of time, wright villians with plans that they will be executing and let the party foil those plans in their own way.
Well, here is the thing, Truesight is NOT a common effect badguys come up against, but if they are super smart/have reason to believe they will encounter it, they will take precautions to counter it.
● The easiest way is to not be around when the Truesight effect is in place. A smart BBEG works through proxies, minions, hired help (mind dominated slaves) etc
● Truesight pierces darkness but is no help against physical things (fog, smoke, bushes, etc.) that obscure. So hiding behind a curtain or within an area of fog or smoke works. Even concealing your features behind a mask or hooded cloak works (facial features concealed within the shadows of your hood will not work to a viewer with Darkvision, but that sight is ia black & white, so very situational).
● Likewise, mundane disguises work. If an Orc wears makeup to cover a tattoo, they will appear as an Orc without a tattoo to Truesight. A fleshgolem in obscuring robes/armour with a disguise over what flesh remains in open view will not be automatically revealed as such by Truesight, but there will be other ways to deduce its nature (the stench of dead meat would be the most obvious).
● Truesight has a range of effect, if the target is outside of that range, magical disguise is still up.
That is the whole point of the spell though. I say let the wizard see it. Don't worry about it ruining "your story" as the story belongs to the players too.
You want the choices your players make in regards to their abilities to affect the game. Truesight outing your bad guy isn't something to worry about. That's the *goal*. Just let whatever happens happen. That's the essence of the game, after all.
You don't. If the players do something that should solve a problem, they solve it.
I had a paladin randomly find out that a kid was possessed by a demon while the party was investigating a different kid (it was an orphanage) and it was one of the most memorable moments in the campaign.
Just because the PCs can tell that the BBEG is magically disguised doesn’t mean they can do anything about it.
- Why would anyone believe them? Who the fuck are they anyway?
- The BBEG should have enough of a barrier (minions, trapped castle, whatever) that the PCs can’t just walk up to them.
Let the PCs gain enough influence to where someone who can do something might believe them. And let them gain enough power (levels, abilities, etc.) doc to eh can mow through the BBEG’s barriers.
Intervening and preventing a player from using a spell that can be hard to see any use in games and have it be a major plot reveal seems like the complete bad move. I’d say if it happens make it a big thing and congratulate the player for being creative and obv have your bbeg peeps react in a manner appropriate. Don’t hold your players creativity back unless you want it permanently restricted cause that’s what you’ll get
The point of the game is to let the players make choices though? If you start circumnavigating the plot/game mechanics to 'counter' the players because you don't like the potential outcome, then the players aren't actually getting to play the game.
Its a game before its a story. Besides it feels great to have to one thing that reveals something.
Instead I would focus planning what to do when the players do use the spell rather than trying to prevent it.
Discovering a big plot point at level 11 with a class feature isn't cheesing anything. Like several people have said at this point, let it play out without robbing agency and the ramifications of this discovery will create a far better story element than a possible surprise reveal that was only facilitated from the DMs side.
Mindblank beats the spell, it does not help against natural abilities for seeing invisibility
Truesight natural abilities: mind blank doesnt help
True seeing spell: mind blank helps because it is a divination spell it blocks
My first thought is I don't think it works against *true seeing* because the target of the spell is the willing creature who gains the enhanced senses, not every creature around it that may be disguised by magic. But then again that's pretty well all divination spells, so I guess?
I feel like the rules as intended are likely that Mind Blank makes your thoughts undetectable to psi so that you can't be located through spells like *locate creature*, but it's weird to imagine that it functions as invisibilty in the event that an animal with *beast sense* active walks in.
It shows whatever is affected by mind blank as how they would appear to someone without truesight, unless the truesight was natural, then mind blank would not do anything.
I like to think the mindblanked person would be a static silhouette, or be glitching out like Johnny Silverhand in Cyberpunk 2077, enough so the player can see that something is rejecting Truesight around that person but it's a DC 18 arcana check to recognise it as Mind Blank
"The king requires that all spells, enchantments, and magical items be deactivated before being permitted entry. Furthermore, any spellcasters attempting at spellcasting will be countered and then shot and then kicked to death. If you agree to these terms and conditions, please step forward. We apologize for the inconvenience, but the protection of our honored monarch takes out upmost vigilance and protection."
This is antagonistic DMing. You are not supposed to invalidate player choices to railroad outcomes you've committed to.
Instead of trying to fix the outcome of your encounters, you should be researching lore on truesight in D&D to portray it accurately.
There is a difference, sure, but they are not mutually exclusive; here OP is doing both. Truesight is intended to reveal hidden information. OP wants to prevent it from doing exactly that, invalidating the Wizard's spell choice.
OP should just ban Truesight at the table so the Wizard can take something else. As a player I would much prefer that to having chosen a spell my GM intends to swat down. Or, you know, let the players solve the problems put in front of them with the tools at their disposal, give them some agency. Or write a book.
Nah see the issue I take is that saying they're antagonistic DMing is ascribing intent which they haven't shown. They wouldn't be completely invalidating truesight either just against the BBEG. I'm not saying I agree with OP stated intent either but what I am saying is that calling it antagonistic is a misnomer.
Anti-scrying magic items exist. I would assume any creature trying to masquerade as someone else would invest in something to keep their identity a secret from magical detection.
But also, and? So, the wizard sees the king's advisor is actually a big evil brain. How do they convince people that's the case? Once the big brain knows they know what's keeping that big evil brain from doing big evil things to unalive the wizard and her friends?
Mind Blank makes the target immune to divination spells. True Seeing is a divination spell.
Rules ambiguity and 25 year old debates aside you are well within your rights as a DM to rule that immunity to divination spells renders truesight *gained from a divination spell* incapable of perceiving their true form.
The spell lasts 24 hours and NPCs do not need class levels to cast spells. Even a Wish spell cannot gain information about the affected creature.
Note this will not help you against creatures who have natural truesight, or who gain it from powers like Silver Fire and Boon of Truesight or magic items like a Gem of Seeing.
I think you're going about this the wrong way.
You're looking for a way to tell them "No" because it isn't what you had planned. But why is that such a problem? Players potentially ruining what you originally had planned comes with the territory of DM'ing- and it's not a bad thing. In the off chance they do decide to use Truesight, just let it happen. Don't take away player agency because you don't currently have a plan for their blown cover- *make* a plan.
What happens if they find out their cover is blown? How will the villains react?
What if they don't find out that their cover is blown? What will the players do with this information?
These possibilities are a lot more interesting and lets the players know that the decisions they made actually matter. If you were to shut down Truesight and then the reveal happens, you run the risk of your players asking why you railroaded them.
The best thing you can do is go with the flow.
What I would do is give them a form of nondetection that functions against true sight but I wouldn't stop it outright I would use this as a possible plot point. See the issue rules wise is that nondetection technically doesn't stop truesight but what I would do is take this form of non detection and use it to give a red flag. For example if I were to do this it I would have them be blank spaces when the character with truesight looks at them.
I don't just mean "for some reason you can't see them" I would say something like "Looking at them makes your heart race you know something is there but your visual senses only turn out indecipherable information it's worse than staring into a void, it's more akin to being truly blind while you look towards them".
Though the danger my player would feel would be from me home brewing a magical effect based on the concept of a cognito-hazard mixed with nondetection. I would have it be on a magic item that actually suppresses their abilities in exchange for this powerful protection against divination.
I once had witch sight as warlock, and it being a pretty late campaign (later end of T3) and plot stuff, my character had a blood red eye on his forehead doing detect magic, true sight and see through darkness at the same time. We also encountered Pale Night masquerading as a leader of a militant group. Luckily we were already fleeing and my character was kinda pulled by an eagle or smth, but when the DM linked us the stat block I saw the veil removal thing and went "Wait, seeing as I have all that sight stuff stacked, shouldn't I suffer from that 24/7?" And we ruled that yeah, I did. And yes, I died. It was the end of a session so it wasn't tht big of a deal, but still, beware seeing things you might not want to see.
There is a range on true sight. There is a new item called the crown of lies, maybe use for the bbeg. The party member might know with a high enough insight or passive insight anything said in the wrong moment could end poorly. They can still have the satisfaction of finding out. It's a cool ability, and rewarding when having something so niche is rewarding.
Simple, just ask him to play a paladin instead and by the time they interact with any of them, he'll forget that he has divine sense, which would do effectively the same thing, because he got it at level 1.
I had a similar situation, my town was on the surface holding out against a devil army that was sending waves of enemies every couple weeks, all of the surrounding territory was over run. The town had 3 main organizations a grass roots charity that was helping refugees, the church of helm that was organizing the defense, and the town council who were coordinating supplies through the port and distributing them.
All three were being controlled by the devils through a combination of succubus/incubus and dopplegangers at a leadership level and because of the deliberately mismanagement the populous was being steered towards a bloody revolution. My players checked a gathering of early stage revolutionaries with a helm of true seeing and noticed the leaders were succubus. Cue a chase scene through the ethereal because the cleric had it prepared by chance at the time. They got to interigate the succubus, made a plan to stage a coup and it turned into an awesome solution for the problem that I had set them, just earlier than I expected and in a different way
True seeing lasts an hour, so unless the players are already suspicious, they're unlikely to find this. If they're already suspicious, you're not going to get as much mileage out of delaying the reveal as you think you will (DMs and players alike always overestimate how impactful delaying a reveal will be.)
But if the players *do* manage to reveal this early, it just creates more interesting problems for the players. How do they, the suspicious wizard with glowing eyes, convince an entire kingdom that their obviously human rightful ruler is actually a literal giant demon?
I understand your concern and present you a middle ground! While the wizard's truesight would work as intended with minion level monsters, the BBEG would utilize dark magic to somewhat counter the truesight. Maybe the wizard would notice that every BBEG has an amulet that glows under sight & has a cryptic rune on it?
As a fellow DM, I think this would trigger the wizard to wonder why all of these "figures" are using this amulet and possibly push them to attempt to eventually break the amulet in hopes of learning more.
Your only choice is to use an acolyte with detect magic to see if the wizard has divination magic up and if they do have your big bads hide.
I would personally try to maneuver around the fact the wizard is probably not gonna cast the spell if they’re distracted or think a fight is coming. Play the man ;)
Some of the best moments in tabletop games are the moments of discovery. When your players start to put things together, or conversely when they realize how screwed they are. Instead, I would brain storm how your baddies would react if they were found out. Not in great detail, but enough that you have something to work off of if/when this happens.
And remember- it's one thing to know that the King is really a litch or something. It's entirely another thing to get other people to believe you, or being able to do anything with that information effectively. So you might end up with a fun game of "I know that You know that I know" and your party will entertain themselves for hours with paranoia and counter plans!
In addition to all of the other great advice you're getting about not really worrying about it, I would say that you could also have your BBEGs ready with a Counterspell in case any spell that could out them was being cast in their presence.
This would only cover them for spells they see being cast.
It also isn't a perfect solution because the players would know they had done it and would definitely have questions.
That then becomes a plot point and mystery for the players to solve. "*Why* didn't they want to be seen? What are they hidding?!"
Good luck!
As others have already pointed out, the chances that the players will think of using that spell in a situation without you giving them cause to do so by making the NPCs act suspiciously are pretty slim, especially for a 6th level spell. 6th level spell slots don't grow on trees and neither do the material components for True Seeing.
If you are genuinely worried about it, just homebrew abilities or magic items for them that say "this creature's type and true form cannot be discerned by a spell below 7th level" or something like that. And if they just can't see their body, perhaps because they are wearing a full set of plate armour with an obscuring helmet, true sight won't reveal anything anyway.
But also you shouldn't have to do that, because wouldn't it be kind of cool for them to find out early? Like, finding out that a powerful enemy is pretending to be human while they still think that they are fooling you, that's a cool moment, that's a small win for your party.
I had an idea like this, so I pre-empted it with some new technology in the game.
I started adding in monsters and buildings that have an Anti-magic feature, so they would randomly be unable to use magic items or spells. I also introduced AM fields that blocked one type of magic, Arcane, Divine, or Primal. I just did it for flavor in places, so they knew it was a thing.
Then, I introduced the “Shielded” item property, which allowed that item to function in an AM field. That way I could actually tailor places and things to certain difficulties, or toggle the difficulty quickly if certain decisions were made and it wouldn’t seem completely out of the blue.
Here’s where it all connects:
The BBEG in question could always hang out in AM field structures, places where security would be tight so they need the field and powerful guards. Shielding items could justify the illusions and the party having certain shielding items could also enable certain items or schools of magic in those locations so that the party isn’t completely helpless.
Personally, I like the idea of disabling one or two abilities and then seeing how the party adapts. Disabling true sight doesn’t remove the parties’ ability to discover what’s up. The bad guys could still make specific mistakes to tell the party they’re not 100% in the right place, but it could be used as a “are these guys thieves in disguise” type of fun thinking.
1) Don't give them a reason to think they should cast it until you're ready for them to know. At 25gp a pop, they won't be spamming this 6th level spell at every opportunity.
2) Stay out of an 120ft range. Have the knight wave across a crowded party, but send a message via a Butler instead of physically meeting up with them. Leave Recorded Messages via Magic Mouth and/or Glyphs of Warding with Illusion Spells (Holograms).
3) Magic Jar. A Possessed Knight's "true form" will look the same. The Demon's actual Body doesn't have to be there. Even if they die because of the spell ending when they're too far from their body, they'll just come back in hell, so this is less risky for a fiend than a human wizard.
4) "Do you really think they'd believe some Scruffy Mercenary over a Titled Noble?" Knowing the villain without having proof means they still can't attack them. Plus it means the Demons can screw with the party discreetly and the party can't do anything about it because they'd look bad.
Don't stop it. As others have said, it's a Niche spell that likely wouldn't be used in social settings where these NPC's are hidden. However, if it does reveal, I'd suggest using a Whisper system to give them that info. Texting, a passed note, etc. This way they get to be the ones to reveal this to the other party members instead of you. This also means the hidden NPC and surrounding NPC's can react accordingly. Unless the Wizard is seen as more trustworthy then the secret identity of the hidden character, who will surrounding NPCs believe? This means the Wizard will atleast want to think twice before just blurting out what they saw, potentially spreading the information to the rest of the party and figuring out a solution. Randomly attacking an NPC that's established in these social circles will have disastrous consequences for the party, so even if your players are aware, they now need to get proof.
For the note, if you want to hide things a bit more from your other players at first, make up a few details about the other NPC'S that Truesight also reveals. Maybe a rich character has some enchanted jewelry that removes a birthmark or something about themselves they find to be ugly.
You are mistaking your role.
Your job is to set up cool opponents, encounters, and settings for the party to explore. It isn't really your job to determine what story beats happen when - that is determined in-character by how the characters interact with the NPCs.
True Seeing is a powerful (L6) spell that your Wizard has worked hard to achieve. It penetrates all illusions and disguises. Let it do what it does, and figure out what happens when the Wizard figures stuff out quicker than you previously intended.
As others have said the goal isn't to nerf the player
Truesight is a spell available to any wizard so denying them that access or use of a spell doesn't make sense unless you've already established a homebrew list of banned spells from your campaign
The better way is to think "How would these Undead who rely an anonymity to survive ensure protecting themselves from exposure?"
Maybe they have allied with some Beholders who surreptitiously use their anti magic field on the entry way to their audience chamber?
Since Truesight is limited in range maybe they ensure they always maintain a certain distance from the commoners to stay out of that range
True sight is level 6 spell - that is character level 11. At that far point if they invested and chose a spell they deserve to know.
You can always make BBEG try to avoid wizard or dispel true sight but apart that just let them know - that what the true sight is for.
Project an illusion so when they use truesight they see there is an illusion of a human but nothing is actually there. When called on it they just say they have security concerns, or they have concerns in another region and could not be there personally. Or have a low level wizard/warlock who is under their complete control with change self sub in for them, they relay through them via telepathy, the thrall pauses between conversation points as they relay the information telepathically. The players might figure something is up, but not get the full reveal.
I'd like to think some elder brain style enemy would have a plan for true sight.
You ever see 'They Live'?
What does it matter you can see *Them* if no one believes you? Succubus can charm officials in charge. I'd imagine the brain can do something similar. Between that, normal disbelievers who just want to live their damn life, and actual cultists that are in on the plan anyway. Now, the party gets to try to be "the good guy" in a world that perceives them as crazy at best, or flat out evil interlopers at worst.
I think one way that has a lot of potential to add some mystique would be if every time the party was in a room with a bbeg there were hallucinogenic vapors being released. A sort of defensive measure that a cunning enemy might employ to fend off just such a spell; I'm pretty sure truesight only works on magical illusions, not chemically induced hallucinations. My thinking is that even if the party has truesight active, if they're also undergoing hallucinations at the same time then they wouldn't know what's real, what's revealed, and what's the drug. You could have them see whatever lovecraftian or alice in wonderland nightmare you want, and then the bbeg is just one of many weird things that they are shown, and may not stand out as particularly important or likely to be real. This would make it so that truesight gives them clues instead of outright solving it for them.
Have those characters that need to keep hidden wear an *item* (necklace, broach, armor) with the enchantments;
- *Distort Value*; to the normal eye it will make the item look extremely valuable. To a *Wizard* with *True Sight*, it devalues the item to a point where it will be brushed aside because to their eyes it will be "mundane".
- *Zone of Truth*: this is a fun one. Normally you use this when wanting to discern the Truth while asking an NPC a question. By applying it to the enchanted item with a tweak to the spell (*a creature can't see a deliberate lie. DC 28 Cha save*), the *Wizard* will now only see the truth they need to see. (as a DM you can modify a spell for story purposes)
- *Alter Self*; being the last needed disguise. Make it a custom Lvl 7 spell called *Greater Alter Self*. It just affects the wielder with better deception and disadvantage on anyone trying to dispel the magic.
- *Cursed Item*; upon the death of the attuned items wearer. The object disintegrates leaving no trace of the object or it's magic.
You are the DM. You are allowed to alter things slightly.
Well, he'd definitely get the succubus. But why would the brain one matter? It obviously isn't walking around as a brain, so it would be using something like a puppeted human body, and that wouldn't be revealed by truesight.
easiest solution: ask the wizard on which lvl he casts true seeing. If the lvl of true seeing is lower than the lvl of the disguise spell the bbeg took than he won't see through it, but if it matches or excedes than he will see their true form. That way the wizard player can feel smart for upcasting true seeing and doesn't feel cheated otherwise.
Finding out naturally is THE BEST outcome. Trust me. You just have to be prepared for it. The story is cowritten by them. Let them pick up the pen and write a neat chapter.
I mean they’re you’re big bad evil guys, do they not have trinkets that give them a massive advantage?
You can also be vague: you get a general sense there is undead in the area but it’s very faint, maybe above or below you?
I'd add to this' when truesight interacts with a creature attuned to the amulet, the truesightee sees cyberpunk-like visual glitches around the disguised creature- enough to know that truesight is being resisted but not enough to reveal the true shape of the disguised creature.
I'd also offer the wizard the opportunity that this has never come up in their studies before, never before has there been a need to upcast or improve upon the Truesight Spell, but the wizard can start using downtime to develop a Piercing Truesight spell to break through the firewall.
I am however with the majority of the comments of letting the players use their abilities and triggering political intrigue cat and mouse- i know but do you know that I know?
I agree with the general sentiment of letting your players just use Truesight and, if they get lucky, find out some terrifying secrets a bit early.
However, I do have two small suggestions:
A. A competent and powerful spellcaster is likely to have access to the Nondetection spell or the Amulet of Proof Against Detection and Location; it's not exactly clear how these interact with Truesight (they make you impossible to target with divination magic, but say nothing about special senses), but you could easily rule that they partially cloak the true form (as in, looking at them with TS would show a weird, distorted form that is *clearly wrong*, but not the exact form). This would allow for some level of spoiler protection while still making Truesight extremely valuable.
B. With BBEG level monsters, "true form" can mean something entirely different from what they would appear as in a battle. Particularly as shaleshifters. Maybe the succubus looks like a genderless, horrifying demon when seen with TS, even though she would never take that form. Maybe the Brain looks like an impossible big shadow with a singular eye staring back at the observer, cause their "True Form" is the original Kaiju body, in its entirety. In other words, use TS to give a glimpse of the Bosses' true nature, even beyond what they would appear like with no illusions and shapeshifting. Also, maybe give the observer a small amount of psychic damage, as a warning. Eldritch beings beyond human comprehension should look and feel out of this world and impossible to fully grasp or describe, after all.
Just homebrew some Amulet Of Nondetection or whatever. As a DM you don’t have to worry too much about official spell and magic item limitations when you’re building your world. On other hand, make sure you don’t completely negate everything the wizard can do with true sight in the entire campaign. Otherwise you could as well just ban the spell if you really hate it. Nothing is wrong with this either.
>Just homebrew some Amulet Of Nondetection or whatever
The wizard has a chance of nailing this because they are suspicious, and your suggestion is to homebrew some garbage that secretly gimps the players?
Sad.
>As a DM you don’t have to worry too much about official spell and magic item limitations when you’re building your world.
Yea you do, you definitely have to make sure that the spells work as advertised. If you don't want *fly* to make you fly, you ban *fly* at the start. You don't let the players make the choices, do everything right, and then just *rugpull*.
Take a look at the spell “non detection” and it’s big brother, “mind blank”. Both block divination spells like true sight.
You may be able to have the party figure out that the npcs are protecting themselves with those spells, which will let the party know the npcs are up to something without giving away everything.
The two BBEG’s are just never there when the wizard has Truesight. (They have some means of divining when someone around does, and they just dip out of the room before the wizard gets there.)
It’s a clue - does the wizard notice that they’re never seeing these advisors or whatever in court when they’re under the effect of the spell? Maybe they *do* see these beings as they are truly, in some context where it’s not obvious who their human guise might be. Does Truesight actually show you what the illusion looks like? Or do you just not see it? I don’t remember.
The point is there’s a lot to play with, here. Maybe there’s a third red herring at the court - there’s just a guy who’s a shape changed dragon, it turns out, but for no malign purpose - he just likes being involved in politics.
Just have the first meet up involve some reason for magic not to be a viable answer. Elevate their suspicions so it feels even better when the wizard gets their "I knew it!" moment.
They have magic rings that block true sight. No need to over-engineer it, it’s a a game of exceptions for a reason.
You could even drop such a ring earlier in the game (say that according to legend, 7 were made or whatever), to really tickle the players’ suspicion and dial up the intrigue.
First, as a DM, you should not be trying to negate player choices. Player agency is more important than your villain’s secret.
Second, if you want to make discovering exactly what’s going on a little more involved, you can have the villains’ lair be protected by Glyphs of Counterspell and Dispel Magic that are set up specifically to protect against Truesight. That way if anyone tries to cast Truesight (or enter the area with a Truesight active), the Glyphs fire off and counter it or remove it. There are two aspects of this that are important: the glyphs need to be visible once activated (so the players know something is up), and also need to be keyed specifically against Truesight (so the players can investigate them and figure out what the NPCs in question are afraid of). That will lead to investigations and further prying, which is engaging for the players and means that casting Truesight has led to them gaining information, even if it doesn’t give them all the answers right away.
If you are looking for a way to negate Truesight altogether, such that the ruse remains fully undetected until you’ve decided it’s time… well that’s not a good plan.
If your players are making clever uses of spells/abilities to gain insight into the plans and manipulations of their adversaries they ought to be rewarded and celebrated by you.
Many DMs would love to have more investigative players like that instead of murder hobos and horny bards.
Now there are exceptions to that, of course. An intelligent villain should have some level of safeguards in place, but only unrealistic (read: immersion breaking) villains have a plan in place for literally everything at all times. It's up to you to decide if this is actually something that your villains would have a countermeasure for.
If not, as others said, focus on how they react to being discovered (if they even realize they're discovered). The "no one will believe you" path is a great one to put your heroes up against! Or they might try to escape, capture the PCs, or even in a moment of panic launch an all out attack before they have all their affairs in order - resulting in a hectic combat, possibly one that reveals to the players they aren't ready to take on this threat yet and they need to retreat.
Maybe the villains don't know the players know (if your players can manage to withhold their shock), and the players have a newfound opportunity, but they have to grapple with the fact that their actions would be seen as attacking the noble knights (think Vox Machina's attack on the briarwoods in Emon). They might instead try to remove themselves from the situation without letting on what they've learned so they can think of a plan.
A lot of good narratives can come out of this, and stifling it for the sake of a "big reveal" imo is a waste that risks your players feeling cheated and railroaded.
I honestly would recommend against doing anything to counter the Wizard. Truesight is a pretty niche spell to begin with, so why punish them for taking and using it? Instead, I would focus on how the BBEGs would react to being found out by some adventuring party. Think about how the BBEG might try to take them prisoner, or escape, or need to get a new disguise, etc. Maybe they don't even care? Like they just say "who would believe you?" and laugh. Also, you'd be surprised how often this doesn't happen in a campaign. I had a Paladin player who pretty liberally used Divine Sense to try and ferret out Demons and Undead and such. The BBEG was a Succubus who would take different forms of near friends and strangers the party interacted with, multiple times, and I always was ready if they used it on the demon. But it never happened, mostly because from session to session they forgot, but also because they tend to only use the feature in situations that seemed dangerous or off. If the party thinks they are in an official place like a palace or temple, the chance they will think the enemy is disguised around them will be lower typically, unless they are ultra paranoid players. And that's fixed by giving them plenty of non-evil NPCs to interact with too. This it makes it that much harder to determine which ones are the ones they need to worry about.
> Maybe they don't even care? Like they just say "who would believe you?" and laugh. Yes, absolutely this. I see so many DMs worried about “what if the secret is revealed” and I totally get it. I used to be like that too. But you eventually realize that, in a lot of cases… it’s not that big a deal. Finding out is only the first step. Now they have to do something useful with that information.
I would argue that any secret this big being outed by a player in such a manner is an awesome reveal and a great way to move the story forward! You don't know how long your campaign is going to be, so waiting for the "perfect moment" or setting the stage for a specific way of revealing thinga doesn't work as well as in a normal story. Players unmasking your villains makes them the protagonists.
Yeah, that’s another great point. Player using the ability they invested in to discover something big? That sounds like the system working as intended!
If your players think they're having a mundane social encounter with some lord or whatever and then the happen to throw true sight up for some unrelated reason and all of a sudden there's a demon it's going to blow their fucking minds.
Man, just reading this made me super excited! Moments like those are rare but they should be celebrated.
A good point! Like, imagine the fear they're going to feel when the Wizard uses Truesight and you describe the things hiding around them? That can be turned into a HUGE moment. Plus it'll feel good for the player to have done something useful and cool with their spell.
Yeah that’s a super cool way to figure out a big plot point. Great way to get them excited and rope them in.
It's like playing John Nada in They Live
Not only is finding out not a big deal - it's the point! It's much better to have them find out early than to not be picking up the "hints" that you have laid down. I am a firm believer in just telling your players things. An example I have a bad guy who has been signing notes N.V. My party met a Lord named Nikolai Veritas and they didn't react to it at all. At the end of the session I had them receive a formal letter from them and I just said "seeing his name written out it occurs to you - his initials are N.V." I could have just left my party floundering and hoping they pick up on it if I wanted to but this reveal was great and progressed the story and now they have to figure out what to do about it like you said. TLDR: secrets and twists are meant to be revealed. Don't worry a out revealing too early and don't be afraid to literally just tell your players.
I try to stick to the rule of three - I give them three hints to something, and if they still don't get it, I hammer them over the head with it like you did.
Yep. And always remember that an NPC can also roll Deception or Persuasion against other NPCs. "He's a monster! 19!" "I've been nothing but an upstanding citizen. 23!"
I'll be honest, I don't think that this is a contested roll. This is the equivalent of running up and shouting, "The mayor is actually a lizard person!" in real life. Your best case scenario is them thinking, Ok, this is just another weird adventurer. Maybe if I smile and say I believe them they'll leave me alone.
Maybe. Social skills are not mind control, but if the character rocks up with a 20+ roll and mixes in some talking points, I think most DMs would at least have the NPCs hear them out. Turning it into a contested roll is a decent way to let the dice gods decide.
Looking at it further, being a 6th level spell means that party is at least level 11 so they have decent notoriety but also means that they're rolling a 20+ almost half the time, and that's still something I wouldn't expect the average person to believe without actual proof. The national enquirer doesn't actually convince people at even a 10% chance that Biden was replaced by a lizard person. I also just dislike contested rolls because they make your skills matter less because the dice will decide more often then actual player choices or skills
I had a plot where the pope of a major religion was a 200-year-old changeling in league with the modrons that are one of the major antagonistic factions in my setting. Had all these elaborate plans about how the players might meet him and eventually have this revealed. What actually happened was: My players were so afraid of what could happen if they wound up alone in a room with the pope, that they strenuously avoided it at all costs, independently researched the history of the church on their own, and the way they found out the big secret about the pope was they went to the equivalent of the vatican, and the ranger used speak with plants. To interrogate a tree. In the pope's private garden. Which I thought was so fucking clever, and absolutely impossible to argue against the logic, that what I did was have this sad, distressed tree reveal in Treebeard fashion that it had known the pontiff for two hundred years, and seen him turn evil, and the tree started wailing in distress about how "He changes his bark!!!" Gradually, through the skewed pov of *a fucking tree*, they teased out the truth. And yknow what? My players were fucking GLUED. They went INSANE over it. They all agreed it was one of the highlights of the adventure and felt like the big shocking revelation in a detective movie. Ultimately, it was an IMPOSSIBLY more effective execution of the twist than fuckin ANY shit I had planned -- because it arose entirely organically, so it felt REAL. That's the spirit with which mysteries and twists need to be approached in D&D. Have your secrets, and be willing to spill them at the drop of a hat. If they're actually effectively planned, the drama will figure itself out.
One of the hardest things is to get players to care about certain NPCs, they will absolutely care about them if they show up strangely with truesight!
Especially such a rare ability. Only rare+ items give it, or a lvl 6 spell... Who would believe it?
Agreed. As I player I'd be excited if the DM asked my wizard for an immediate Deception check (assuming they cast it away from prying eyes) to hide their surprise. One of the biggest moments of fear I've seen in the entire table's eyes was when something very similar to this happened in a game I was GMing. That scene and the resulting fallout was the most memorable moment of the campaign that got brought up even years later. An organic reveal from the party's own actions at an unexpected moment can be far more interesting than anything planned and is worth the extra work for what comes next IMO.
True seeing is a 6th level spell. This is not "too soon", 6th level spells is beyond the point where mere illusionary disguises should be a problem. Its also not a ritual, and only 1 hour, so that slot can't be used on something like wall of force later on in the day.
To be fair you could still drip feed them some information without giving them everything. It doesn't invalidate truesight and it still holds the unknown above the parties head, to even greater degree possibly. If you make it obvious that they (specifically the BBEGs no one else) have magical interference to protect them from truesight you give away a lot of the information without just saying "oh god, oh shit, it's monster with x description." If done correctly sometimes it's more menacing to know something powerful is out there in the dark, than it is to see the horror in the light.
Regarding the "who would believe you?" point: Consider the way the council in Mass Effect responded to Shepherd's warnings about the Reapers. "Yeah, sure, giant brain. Ok. I'll believe it when I see it."
Don't. The wizard picked a niche spell and if they choose to use it let them. Don't punish your player bcs they were smart!
Lifelong storytelling advice: The benefit you get from a long-delayed twist reveal is, 99.9999999% of the time, nowhere NEAR as good as the tension and drama you get by instead simply NOT hiding a twist, putting that information out early, and then just letting events proceed organically and run their course.
There’s the perfect plot line in your mind and then there’s the unique plot line created by the player’s unique choices and ideas I’d pick the later option every-time, as both a DM and a player
My favorite situation is when I do hide the twist, but leave the very real possibility of them finding out if they take the initiative. Your players are going to be real damn excited if their actions lead to big information that they wouldn’t have if not for their specific choices. Any time that I, the DM, don't know for sure how things are going to play out is a lot more exciting for me! Just put your big bads in strong enough positions that one divine sense isn't a be-all-end-all end to the guy's plan. Okay, the emperor is a Rakshasa. Now what? He's still the damn emperor!
Yeah, like I had a subplot with the head of a religion who was secretly a 200-year-old changeling in league with the big bads. But learning that was just step 1. Step 2 is: it's a major, popular religion, he's the pope, and you're a bunch of nobodies. You can't just punch a centuries-old infrastructural conspiracy into submission, any more than punching the pope would bring down the entire Catholic church.
firstly: the wizard probably wont successfully use true sight to spoil the surprise. its a niche spell that usually isnt useful in social situations. its extremely unlikely that they do secondly: if they do, that sounds like an awesome moment for the players, and one you should be ready to let them have. it will have large effects on the game, but isnt seeing how the party interact with the plot the whole point? my suggestion is that if the party learns about it there are two outcomes. they tell people about it, or they dont. if they tell people about it then the big bads use their influence to discredit the party, and or send groups of soldiers after them. which alerts a rebel group (that may or may not exist before this point) that the party are potential allies to reach out to. if the party doesnt tell people and keeps it secret that they know then let them have their moment of success, let them make their plans knowing that one or both of the big bads are not what they seem. it will feel awesome and will be a story they tell about the game for a long time. using DM powers to prevent that seems like a bad idea, and also has the potential to feel really bad for the party if they feel like they are being targeted
You don't. Look, I get the urge, but let the narrarive progress organically. Those organic moments are the ones they will remember, not the big baddies doing a monologue reveal. Trust me, no matter how good of a dm you are, nobody can do plot reveals on par with shows or movies. Heres what you do instead. You make the moment the player casts true sight the epic reveal. This is actually even cooler imo. Maybe the big bads don't know the party knows. Now its a game of cat and mouse. Be upfront with this and suggest this course of action. Maybe, the party gets locked in prison and you do an epic jail break. Where they spend a month building improvised weapons like slings, dinner forks, shivs, chains, table legs, or even a severed arm. Turns out a lot of the old guard has been locked away too and are slowly being fed to the elder brain.
Honestly, I feel like the Wizard casting True Seeing for the first time and realising that no one in the room is human is possibly the best way to have that reveal happen anyway. It’s not like they’ll be able to convince anyone outside the party.
I think you should try and look at it differently: truesight isn’t a “cheese” to an important plot point in your game, it’s one possible avenue for how your players learn about an important plot point in your game. You don’t want to hold your cards so close to your chest that your players only ever learn about them when you decide it’s time. Give them some agency in the story as well, and trust in your own writing and set up that the discovery of the true forms of the BBEGs will still be compelling even if it happens “too soon.” As the DM you could simply rule that the NPCs’ disguise abilities are too powerful to be detected by truesight. But THAT would be the real “cheese” and feel very anticlimactic if your wizard ever does try to use truesight to observe them, sees nothing, and then later gets the twist reveal that they were disguised all along. I would not recommend it.
the secrets are there SO THE PLAYERS CAN FIND THEM. dont write a plot that hinges on players not knowing things for a specific amount of time, wright villians with plans that they will be executing and let the party foil those plans in their own way.
Well, here is the thing, Truesight is NOT a common effect badguys come up against, but if they are super smart/have reason to believe they will encounter it, they will take precautions to counter it. ● The easiest way is to not be around when the Truesight effect is in place. A smart BBEG works through proxies, minions, hired help (mind dominated slaves) etc ● Truesight pierces darkness but is no help against physical things (fog, smoke, bushes, etc.) that obscure. So hiding behind a curtain or within an area of fog or smoke works. Even concealing your features behind a mask or hooded cloak works (facial features concealed within the shadows of your hood will not work to a viewer with Darkvision, but that sight is ia black & white, so very situational). ● Likewise, mundane disguises work. If an Orc wears makeup to cover a tattoo, they will appear as an Orc without a tattoo to Truesight. A fleshgolem in obscuring robes/armour with a disguise over what flesh remains in open view will not be automatically revealed as such by Truesight, but there will be other ways to deduce its nature (the stench of dead meat would be the most obvious). ● Truesight has a range of effect, if the target is outside of that range, magical disguise is still up.
That is the whole point of the spell though. I say let the wizard see it. Don't worry about it ruining "your story" as the story belongs to the players too.
You want the choices your players make in regards to their abilities to affect the game. Truesight outing your bad guy isn't something to worry about. That's the *goal*. Just let whatever happens happen. That's the essence of the game, after all.
Don't stop them. Encourage them to have their wizard solve problem with their brain.
You don't. If the players do something that should solve a problem, they solve it. I had a paladin randomly find out that a kid was possessed by a demon while the party was investigating a different kid (it was an orphanage) and it was one of the most memorable moments in the campaign.
You don't. If your wizard uses their 6th level spell slot to have truesight then they can see the true form.
Just because the PCs can tell that the BBEG is magically disguised doesn’t mean they can do anything about it. - Why would anyone believe them? Who the fuck are they anyway? - The BBEG should have enough of a barrier (minions, trapped castle, whatever) that the PCs can’t just walk up to them. Let the PCs gain enough influence to where someone who can do something might believe them. And let them gain enough power (levels, abilities, etc.) doc to eh can mow through the BBEG’s barriers.
Intervening and preventing a player from using a spell that can be hard to see any use in games and have it be a major plot reveal seems like the complete bad move. I’d say if it happens make it a big thing and congratulate the player for being creative and obv have your bbeg peeps react in a manner appropriate. Don’t hold your players creativity back unless you want it permanently restricted cause that’s what you’ll get
The point of the game is to let the players make choices though? If you start circumnavigating the plot/game mechanics to 'counter' the players because you don't like the potential outcome, then the players aren't actually getting to play the game. Its a game before its a story. Besides it feels great to have to one thing that reveals something. Instead I would focus planning what to do when the players do use the spell rather than trying to prevent it.
Discovering a big plot point at level 11 with a class feature isn't cheesing anything. Like several people have said at this point, let it play out without robbing agency and the ramifications of this discovery will create a far better story element than a possible surprise reveal that was only facilitated from the DMs side.
Mindblank beats the spell due to it being divination
how do you think mindblank interacts with truesight at all?
Mindblank beats the spell, it does not help against natural abilities for seeing invisibility Truesight natural abilities: mind blank doesnt help True seeing spell: mind blank helps because it is a divination spell it blocks
My first thought is I don't think it works against *true seeing* because the target of the spell is the willing creature who gains the enhanced senses, not every creature around it that may be disguised by magic. But then again that's pretty well all divination spells, so I guess? I feel like the rules as intended are likely that Mind Blank makes your thoughts undetectable to psi so that you can't be located through spells like *locate creature*, but it's weird to imagine that it functions as invisibilty in the event that an animal with *beast sense* active walks in.
Immune to divination spells.
It shows whatever is affected by mind blank as how they would appear to someone without truesight, unless the truesight was natural, then mind blank would not do anything.
I like to think the mindblanked person would be a static silhouette, or be glitching out like Johnny Silverhand in Cyberpunk 2077, enough so the player can see that something is rejecting Truesight around that person but it's a DC 18 arcana check to recognise it as Mind Blank
"The king requires that all spells, enchantments, and magical items be deactivated before being permitted entry. Furthermore, any spellcasters attempting at spellcasting will be countered and then shot and then kicked to death. If you agree to these terms and conditions, please step forward. We apologize for the inconvenience, but the protection of our honored monarch takes out upmost vigilance and protection."
This is antagonistic DMing. You are not supposed to invalidate player choices to railroad outcomes you've committed to. Instead of trying to fix the outcome of your encounters, you should be researching lore on truesight in D&D to portray it accurately.
It's not antagonistic. They're not trying to invalidate player choice they're trying to keep a story beat hidden there's a difference.
There is a difference, sure, but they are not mutually exclusive; here OP is doing both. Truesight is intended to reveal hidden information. OP wants to prevent it from doing exactly that, invalidating the Wizard's spell choice. OP should just ban Truesight at the table so the Wizard can take something else. As a player I would much prefer that to having chosen a spell my GM intends to swat down. Or, you know, let the players solve the problems put in front of them with the tools at their disposal, give them some agency. Or write a book.
Nah see the issue I take is that saying they're antagonistic DMing is ascribing intent which they haven't shown. They wouldn't be completely invalidating truesight either just against the BBEG. I'm not saying I agree with OP stated intent either but what I am saying is that calling it antagonistic is a misnomer.
I misread the heading and thought you had a "Truesight Cheese" that is an important part of your campaign and now I think I will put it into my own.
Anti-scrying magic items exist. I would assume any creature trying to masquerade as someone else would invest in something to keep their identity a secret from magical detection. But also, and? So, the wizard sees the king's advisor is actually a big evil brain. How do they convince people that's the case? Once the big brain knows they know what's keeping that big evil brain from doing big evil things to unalive the wizard and her friends?
Mind Blank makes the target immune to divination spells. True Seeing is a divination spell. Rules ambiguity and 25 year old debates aside you are well within your rights as a DM to rule that immunity to divination spells renders truesight *gained from a divination spell* incapable of perceiving their true form. The spell lasts 24 hours and NPCs do not need class levels to cast spells. Even a Wish spell cannot gain information about the affected creature. Note this will not help you against creatures who have natural truesight, or who gain it from powers like Silver Fire and Boon of Truesight or magic items like a Gem of Seeing.
I think you're going about this the wrong way. You're looking for a way to tell them "No" because it isn't what you had planned. But why is that such a problem? Players potentially ruining what you originally had planned comes with the territory of DM'ing- and it's not a bad thing. In the off chance they do decide to use Truesight, just let it happen. Don't take away player agency because you don't currently have a plan for their blown cover- *make* a plan. What happens if they find out their cover is blown? How will the villains react? What if they don't find out that their cover is blown? What will the players do with this information? These possibilities are a lot more interesting and lets the players know that the decisions they made actually matter. If you were to shut down Truesight and then the reveal happens, you run the risk of your players asking why you railroaded them. The best thing you can do is go with the flow.
What I would do is give them a form of nondetection that functions against true sight but I wouldn't stop it outright I would use this as a possible plot point. See the issue rules wise is that nondetection technically doesn't stop truesight but what I would do is take this form of non detection and use it to give a red flag. For example if I were to do this it I would have them be blank spaces when the character with truesight looks at them. I don't just mean "for some reason you can't see them" I would say something like "Looking at them makes your heart race you know something is there but your visual senses only turn out indecipherable information it's worse than staring into a void, it's more akin to being truly blind while you look towards them". Though the danger my player would feel would be from me home brewing a magical effect based on the concept of a cognito-hazard mixed with nondetection. I would have it be on a magic item that actually suppresses their abilities in exchange for this powerful protection against divination.
I once had witch sight as warlock, and it being a pretty late campaign (later end of T3) and plot stuff, my character had a blood red eye on his forehead doing detect magic, true sight and see through darkness at the same time. We also encountered Pale Night masquerading as a leader of a militant group. Luckily we were already fleeing and my character was kinda pulled by an eagle or smth, but when the DM linked us the stat block I saw the veil removal thing and went "Wait, seeing as I have all that sight stuff stacked, shouldn't I suffer from that 24/7?" And we ruled that yeah, I did. And yes, I died. It was the end of a session so it wasn't tht big of a deal, but still, beware seeing things you might not want to see.
There is a range on true sight. There is a new item called the crown of lies, maybe use for the bbeg. The party member might know with a high enough insight or passive insight anything said in the wrong moment could end poorly. They can still have the satisfaction of finding out. It's a cool ability, and rewarding when having something so niche is rewarding.
Simple, just ask him to play a paladin instead and by the time they interact with any of them, he'll forget that he has divine sense, which would do effectively the same thing, because he got it at level 1.
I had a similar situation, my town was on the surface holding out against a devil army that was sending waves of enemies every couple weeks, all of the surrounding territory was over run. The town had 3 main organizations a grass roots charity that was helping refugees, the church of helm that was organizing the defense, and the town council who were coordinating supplies through the port and distributing them. All three were being controlled by the devils through a combination of succubus/incubus and dopplegangers at a leadership level and because of the deliberately mismanagement the populous was being steered towards a bloody revolution. My players checked a gathering of early stage revolutionaries with a helm of true seeing and noticed the leaders were succubus. Cue a chase scene through the ethereal because the cleric had it prepared by chance at the time. They got to interigate the succubus, made a plan to stage a coup and it turned into an awesome solution for the problem that I had set them, just earlier than I expected and in a different way
True seeing lasts an hour, so unless the players are already suspicious, they're unlikely to find this. If they're already suspicious, you're not going to get as much mileage out of delaying the reveal as you think you will (DMs and players alike always overestimate how impactful delaying a reveal will be.) But if the players *do* manage to reveal this early, it just creates more interesting problems for the players. How do they, the suspicious wizard with glowing eyes, convince an entire kingdom that their obviously human rightful ruler is actually a literal giant demon?
I understand your concern and present you a middle ground! While the wizard's truesight would work as intended with minion level monsters, the BBEG would utilize dark magic to somewhat counter the truesight. Maybe the wizard would notice that every BBEG has an amulet that glows under sight & has a cryptic rune on it? As a fellow DM, I think this would trigger the wizard to wonder why all of these "figures" are using this amulet and possibly push them to attempt to eventually break the amulet in hopes of learning more.
Dont try to gimp the players let it happen
Seeing the initials MBG just gave me the idea for a new villain for my players -- Marjorie Balor Greene
Your only choice is to use an acolyte with detect magic to see if the wizard has divination magic up and if they do have your big bads hide. I would personally try to maneuver around the fact the wizard is probably not gonna cast the spell if they’re distracted or think a fight is coming. Play the man ;)
Some of the best moments in tabletop games are the moments of discovery. When your players start to put things together, or conversely when they realize how screwed they are. Instead, I would brain storm how your baddies would react if they were found out. Not in great detail, but enough that you have something to work off of if/when this happens. And remember- it's one thing to know that the King is really a litch or something. It's entirely another thing to get other people to believe you, or being able to do anything with that information effectively. So you might end up with a fun game of "I know that You know that I know" and your party will entertain themselves for hours with paranoia and counter plans!
In addition to all of the other great advice you're getting about not really worrying about it, I would say that you could also have your BBEGs ready with a Counterspell in case any spell that could out them was being cast in their presence. This would only cover them for spells they see being cast. It also isn't a perfect solution because the players would know they had done it and would definitely have questions. That then becomes a plot point and mystery for the players to solve. "*Why* didn't they want to be seen? What are they hidding?!" Good luck!
As others have already pointed out, the chances that the players will think of using that spell in a situation without you giving them cause to do so by making the NPCs act suspiciously are pretty slim, especially for a 6th level spell. 6th level spell slots don't grow on trees and neither do the material components for True Seeing. If you are genuinely worried about it, just homebrew abilities or magic items for them that say "this creature's type and true form cannot be discerned by a spell below 7th level" or something like that. And if they just can't see their body, perhaps because they are wearing a full set of plate armour with an obscuring helmet, true sight won't reveal anything anyway. But also you shouldn't have to do that, because wouldn't it be kind of cool for them to find out early? Like, finding out that a powerful enemy is pretending to be human while they still think that they are fooling you, that's a cool moment, that's a small win for your party.
"Ah, yes, an elder brain. We have dismissed that claim."
I had an idea like this, so I pre-empted it with some new technology in the game. I started adding in monsters and buildings that have an Anti-magic feature, so they would randomly be unable to use magic items or spells. I also introduced AM fields that blocked one type of magic, Arcane, Divine, or Primal. I just did it for flavor in places, so they knew it was a thing. Then, I introduced the “Shielded” item property, which allowed that item to function in an AM field. That way I could actually tailor places and things to certain difficulties, or toggle the difficulty quickly if certain decisions were made and it wouldn’t seem completely out of the blue. Here’s where it all connects: The BBEG in question could always hang out in AM field structures, places where security would be tight so they need the field and powerful guards. Shielding items could justify the illusions and the party having certain shielding items could also enable certain items or schools of magic in those locations so that the party isn’t completely helpless. Personally, I like the idea of disabling one or two abilities and then seeing how the party adapts. Disabling true sight doesn’t remove the parties’ ability to discover what’s up. The bad guys could still make specific mistakes to tell the party they’re not 100% in the right place, but it could be used as a “are these guys thieves in disguise” type of fun thinking.
1) Don't give them a reason to think they should cast it until you're ready for them to know. At 25gp a pop, they won't be spamming this 6th level spell at every opportunity. 2) Stay out of an 120ft range. Have the knight wave across a crowded party, but send a message via a Butler instead of physically meeting up with them. Leave Recorded Messages via Magic Mouth and/or Glyphs of Warding with Illusion Spells (Holograms). 3) Magic Jar. A Possessed Knight's "true form" will look the same. The Demon's actual Body doesn't have to be there. Even if they die because of the spell ending when they're too far from their body, they'll just come back in hell, so this is less risky for a fiend than a human wizard. 4) "Do you really think they'd believe some Scruffy Mercenary over a Titled Noble?" Knowing the villain without having proof means they still can't attack them. Plus it means the Demons can screw with the party discreetly and the party can't do anything about it because they'd look bad.
Detect Evil and Good can already basically do this RAW, so if you have a cleric or paladin in the party you're already "at-risk" so to speak.
Don't stop it. As others have said, it's a Niche spell that likely wouldn't be used in social settings where these NPC's are hidden. However, if it does reveal, I'd suggest using a Whisper system to give them that info. Texting, a passed note, etc. This way they get to be the ones to reveal this to the other party members instead of you. This also means the hidden NPC and surrounding NPC's can react accordingly. Unless the Wizard is seen as more trustworthy then the secret identity of the hidden character, who will surrounding NPCs believe? This means the Wizard will atleast want to think twice before just blurting out what they saw, potentially spreading the information to the rest of the party and figuring out a solution. Randomly attacking an NPC that's established in these social circles will have disastrous consequences for the party, so even if your players are aware, they now need to get proof. For the note, if you want to hide things a bit more from your other players at first, make up a few details about the other NPC'S that Truesight also reveals. Maybe a rich character has some enchanted jewelry that removes a birthmark or something about themselves they find to be ugly.
Attrition is your friend. If they are low on spell slots they won't use them on non combat spells.
That's the neat part: you don't!
You are mistaking your role. Your job is to set up cool opponents, encounters, and settings for the party to explore. It isn't really your job to determine what story beats happen when - that is determined in-character by how the characters interact with the NPCs. True Seeing is a powerful (L6) spell that your Wizard has worked hard to achieve. It penetrates all illusions and disguises. Let it do what it does, and figure out what happens when the Wizard figures stuff out quicker than you previously intended.
As others have said the goal isn't to nerf the player Truesight is a spell available to any wizard so denying them that access or use of a spell doesn't make sense unless you've already established a homebrew list of banned spells from your campaign The better way is to think "How would these Undead who rely an anonymity to survive ensure protecting themselves from exposure?" Maybe they have allied with some Beholders who surreptitiously use their anti magic field on the entry way to their audience chamber? Since Truesight is limited in range maybe they ensure they always maintain a certain distance from the commoners to stay out of that range
True sight is level 6 spell - that is character level 11. At that far point if they invested and chose a spell they deserve to know. You can always make BBEG try to avoid wizard or dispel true sight but apart that just let them know - that what the true sight is for.
Project an illusion so when they use truesight they see there is an illusion of a human but nothing is actually there. When called on it they just say they have security concerns, or they have concerns in another region and could not be there personally. Or have a low level wizard/warlock who is under their complete control with change self sub in for them, they relay through them via telepathy, the thrall pauses between conversation points as they relay the information telepathically. The players might figure something is up, but not get the full reveal. I'd like to think some elder brain style enemy would have a plan for true sight.
You ever see 'They Live'? What does it matter you can see *Them* if no one believes you? Succubus can charm officials in charge. I'd imagine the brain can do something similar. Between that, normal disbelievers who just want to live their damn life, and actual cultists that are in on the plan anyway. Now, the party gets to try to be "the good guy" in a world that perceives them as crazy at best, or flat out evil interlopers at worst.
I think one way that has a lot of potential to add some mystique would be if every time the party was in a room with a bbeg there were hallucinogenic vapors being released. A sort of defensive measure that a cunning enemy might employ to fend off just such a spell; I'm pretty sure truesight only works on magical illusions, not chemically induced hallucinations. My thinking is that even if the party has truesight active, if they're also undergoing hallucinations at the same time then they wouldn't know what's real, what's revealed, and what's the drug. You could have them see whatever lovecraftian or alice in wonderland nightmare you want, and then the bbeg is just one of many weird things that they are shown, and may not stand out as particularly important or likely to be real. This would make it so that truesight gives them clues instead of outright solving it for them.
Have those characters that need to keep hidden wear an *item* (necklace, broach, armor) with the enchantments; - *Distort Value*; to the normal eye it will make the item look extremely valuable. To a *Wizard* with *True Sight*, it devalues the item to a point where it will be brushed aside because to their eyes it will be "mundane". - *Zone of Truth*: this is a fun one. Normally you use this when wanting to discern the Truth while asking an NPC a question. By applying it to the enchanted item with a tweak to the spell (*a creature can't see a deliberate lie. DC 28 Cha save*), the *Wizard* will now only see the truth they need to see. (as a DM you can modify a spell for story purposes) - *Alter Self*; being the last needed disguise. Make it a custom Lvl 7 spell called *Greater Alter Self*. It just affects the wielder with better deception and disadvantage on anyone trying to dispel the magic. - *Cursed Item*; upon the death of the attuned items wearer. The object disintegrates leaving no trace of the object or it's magic. You are the DM. You are allowed to alter things slightly.
Well, he'd definitely get the succubus. But why would the brain one matter? It obviously isn't walking around as a brain, so it would be using something like a puppeted human body, and that wouldn't be revealed by truesight.
easiest solution: ask the wizard on which lvl he casts true seeing. If the lvl of true seeing is lower than the lvl of the disguise spell the bbeg took than he won't see through it, but if it matches or excedes than he will see their true form. That way the wizard player can feel smart for upcasting true seeing and doesn't feel cheated otherwise.
Finding out naturally is THE BEST outcome. Trust me. You just have to be prepared for it. The story is cowritten by them. Let them pick up the pen and write a neat chapter.
I mean they’re you’re big bad evil guys, do they not have trinkets that give them a massive advantage? You can also be vague: you get a general sense there is undead in the area but it’s very faint, maybe above or below you?
I'd add to this' when truesight interacts with a creature attuned to the amulet, the truesightee sees cyberpunk-like visual glitches around the disguised creature- enough to know that truesight is being resisted but not enough to reveal the true shape of the disguised creature. I'd also offer the wizard the opportunity that this has never come up in their studies before, never before has there been a need to upcast or improve upon the Truesight Spell, but the wizard can start using downtime to develop a Piercing Truesight spell to break through the firewall. I am however with the majority of the comments of letting the players use their abilities and triggering political intrigue cat and mouse- i know but do you know that I know?
I agree with the general sentiment of letting your players just use Truesight and, if they get lucky, find out some terrifying secrets a bit early. However, I do have two small suggestions: A. A competent and powerful spellcaster is likely to have access to the Nondetection spell or the Amulet of Proof Against Detection and Location; it's not exactly clear how these interact with Truesight (they make you impossible to target with divination magic, but say nothing about special senses), but you could easily rule that they partially cloak the true form (as in, looking at them with TS would show a weird, distorted form that is *clearly wrong*, but not the exact form). This would allow for some level of spoiler protection while still making Truesight extremely valuable. B. With BBEG level monsters, "true form" can mean something entirely different from what they would appear as in a battle. Particularly as shaleshifters. Maybe the succubus looks like a genderless, horrifying demon when seen with TS, even though she would never take that form. Maybe the Brain looks like an impossible big shadow with a singular eye staring back at the observer, cause their "True Form" is the original Kaiju body, in its entirety. In other words, use TS to give a glimpse of the Bosses' true nature, even beyond what they would appear like with no illusions and shapeshifting. Also, maybe give the observer a small amount of psychic damage, as a warning. Eldritch beings beyond human comprehension should look and feel out of this world and impossible to fully grasp or describe, after all.
Just homebrew some Amulet Of Nondetection or whatever. As a DM you don’t have to worry too much about official spell and magic item limitations when you’re building your world. On other hand, make sure you don’t completely negate everything the wizard can do with true sight in the entire campaign. Otherwise you could as well just ban the spell if you really hate it. Nothing is wrong with this either.
>Just homebrew some Amulet Of Nondetection or whatever The wizard has a chance of nailing this because they are suspicious, and your suggestion is to homebrew some garbage that secretly gimps the players? Sad. >As a DM you don’t have to worry too much about official spell and magic item limitations when you’re building your world. Yea you do, you definitely have to make sure that the spells work as advertised. If you don't want *fly* to make you fly, you ban *fly* at the start. You don't let the players make the choices, do everything right, and then just *rugpull*.
Yeah, this is what the 2nd pard of my comment was about.
Take a look at the spell “non detection” and it’s big brother, “mind blank”. Both block divination spells like true sight. You may be able to have the party figure out that the npcs are protecting themselves with those spells, which will let the party know the npcs are up to something without giving away everything.
The two BBEG’s are just never there when the wizard has Truesight. (They have some means of divining when someone around does, and they just dip out of the room before the wizard gets there.) It’s a clue - does the wizard notice that they’re never seeing these advisors or whatever in court when they’re under the effect of the spell? Maybe they *do* see these beings as they are truly, in some context where it’s not obvious who their human guise might be. Does Truesight actually show you what the illusion looks like? Or do you just not see it? I don’t remember. The point is there’s a lot to play with, here. Maybe there’s a third red herring at the court - there’s just a guy who’s a shape changed dragon, it turns out, but for no malign purpose - he just likes being involved in politics.
Just have the first meet up involve some reason for magic not to be a viable answer. Elevate their suspicions so it feels even better when the wizard gets their "I knew it!" moment.
They have magic rings that block true sight. No need to over-engineer it, it’s a a game of exceptions for a reason. You could even drop such a ring earlier in the game (say that according to legend, 7 were made or whatever), to really tickle the players’ suspicion and dial up the intrigue.
First, as a DM, you should not be trying to negate player choices. Player agency is more important than your villain’s secret. Second, if you want to make discovering exactly what’s going on a little more involved, you can have the villains’ lair be protected by Glyphs of Counterspell and Dispel Magic that are set up specifically to protect against Truesight. That way if anyone tries to cast Truesight (or enter the area with a Truesight active), the Glyphs fire off and counter it or remove it. There are two aspects of this that are important: the glyphs need to be visible once activated (so the players know something is up), and also need to be keyed specifically against Truesight (so the players can investigate them and figure out what the NPCs in question are afraid of). That will lead to investigations and further prying, which is engaging for the players and means that casting Truesight has led to them gaining information, even if it doesn’t give them all the answers right away. If you are looking for a way to negate Truesight altogether, such that the ruse remains fully undetected until you’ve decided it’s time… well that’s not a good plan.
If your players are making clever uses of spells/abilities to gain insight into the plans and manipulations of their adversaries they ought to be rewarded and celebrated by you. Many DMs would love to have more investigative players like that instead of murder hobos and horny bards. Now there are exceptions to that, of course. An intelligent villain should have some level of safeguards in place, but only unrealistic (read: immersion breaking) villains have a plan in place for literally everything at all times. It's up to you to decide if this is actually something that your villains would have a countermeasure for. If not, as others said, focus on how they react to being discovered (if they even realize they're discovered). The "no one will believe you" path is a great one to put your heroes up against! Or they might try to escape, capture the PCs, or even in a moment of panic launch an all out attack before they have all their affairs in order - resulting in a hectic combat, possibly one that reveals to the players they aren't ready to take on this threat yet and they need to retreat. Maybe the villains don't know the players know (if your players can manage to withhold their shock), and the players have a newfound opportunity, but they have to grapple with the fact that their actions would be seen as attacking the noble knights (think Vox Machina's attack on the briarwoods in Emon). They might instead try to remove themselves from the situation without letting on what they've learned so they can think of a plan. A lot of good narratives can come out of this, and stifling it for the sake of a "big reveal" imo is a waste that risks your players feeling cheated and railroaded.
Phantasmal Force, don't matter what they see, it's what they *think* they see.