Flasmix wrote:To be perfectly honest, I would be happy if 'Greater Sanctuary/Etherealness' was changed so that nothing can hurt the user at all but in exchange, nobody can buff themselves to Godliness beneath it. If under effect of the spell and you cast ANY spell at all, it wears off.
An ethereal creature is invisible, insubstantial, and capable of moving in any direction, even up or down, albeit at half normal speed. As an insubstantial creature, you can move through solid objects, including living creatures. An ethereal creature can see and hear on the Material Plane, but everything looks gray and ephemeral. Sight and hearing onto the Material Plane are limited to 60 feet.
Force effects and abjurations affect an ethereal creature normally.
There are "legal" means to attack an caster that is Ethereal. The other option would be to also cast Ethereal, becoming ethereal as well, and then dueling it out in the Ethereal Plane.
The reason it was changed from an Etherealness Effect to a Sanctuary Effect is because it would allow PC's to pass through walls and enter guildhalls. The effect is too powerful. Instead of changing the spell so that only force effects would work on it they changed it to be a 'Greater Sanctuary' effect. This was also due to the spells being programmed almost exactly the same.
Wirg to Pug: "Iz lat dun?"
Pugratix to a snarky militia man: "Mmmm. Not yet. I will live for hundreds of years and be heralded as one of the greatest forces of destruction on the face of the world. The only thing you can destroy is the outhouse."
Greater Sanctuary wrote:Description: The caster becomes ethereal. No other creature can detect the caster. Attacking or performing a hostile action will make the etherealness vanish.
Though it says no other creature can detect the caster, it does not protect the Caster from AoE. But it DOES conflict with the aspect of becoming Ethereal. So in it's description, it should be changed from stating so, or, the Spell itself should be removed and replaced with Greater Sanctuary.
Flasmix wrote:The reason it was changed from an Etherealness Effect to a Sanctuary Effect is because it would allow PC's to pass through walls and enter guildhalls. The effect is too powerful. Instead of changing the spell so that only force effects would work on it they changed it to be a 'Greater Sanctuary' effect. This was also due to the spells being programmed almost exactly the same.
This would be a pnp granted power, and there are also pnp spells that prevents such travel. A cleric can cast Forbiddance, and that's a huge area and permanent too. Infiltrating an area this way still remains super dangerous... a meager see invisibility can spot him, no need for true seeing... Any powerful faction can counter this easy, just need one wizard or one cleric or similar.
While on the topic, Is there a way to fix the issue with casting Sanctuary/Greater Sanctuary off screen/map and people still being able to see you like normal?
Ive had some awkward conversations where I cast the spell, then transition maps, run in to someone else and figure 'Hey, they shouldn't be able to see me or at least identify that I am in Sanctuary (With the whole PC is covered in a white sheen)', only to appear like normal because the spell was cast in a different map.
In addition to that, sometimes Monsters can detect you enough to follow you around, but since you are Sanctuary (Even though the white sheen is gone from around your PC) they can't actually target you. So, they just follow you around bumping in to you in an attempt to attack something they can't.
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-Aaron Lyonaler
The Sanctuary line of spells only prevents a hostile creature from attacking you directly. That does not stop the creature from being aware of your presence, or taking indirect measures to hinder or harm you (e.g. Area of Effect attacks).
Personally, I think Ethereal Jaunt should be named a sanctuary effect. Nwn2's ethereal effect works exactly how PnP's sanctuary effect works, so, it only makes sense imo. You can be seen, and indirectly attacked with AoEs (etc), but direct attacks fail.
Maybe allow DMs to let players use it as an Ethereal spell in events, on their own discretion of course. Then they can oversee the whole "walking through walls" thing.
The problem with making it apply invisibility, is that if you have see invisibility, you'll be able to attack the ethereal target. Its an nwn2 bug that has been explored on other servers before (and has been shown to cripple this "solution").
Meanwhile this decision stays up in the air people are dying. Each time it does you have players discussing the death afterwards taking away from the arpee.
A change to make Ethereal Jaunt and Etherealness more in line with PnP may be in the works, but it will not be forthcoming for a while to come. Until then, this is our stance:
In day-to-day use, consider Ethereal Jaunt and Greater Sanctuary as sanctuary effects. A target under a sanctuary effect cannot be attacked directly, but can be harmed or hindered by area-of-effect attacks or other methods that do not involve targeting the warded creature.
This is a temporary ruling and will be subject to change should Ethereal Jaunt and Etherealness/Greater Sanctuary be revisited.
