So, how does major image even work?

[Agraham]

It's a given that major image is a Glamer, but the Glamer subschool description (PHB 173) kind a kicks the spell in the nuts, repeatedly, with a boot blade; “Figments and Glamers… cannot support weight.”

So, what the hell is the point of spells like major image and mirage arcana including “audio, visual, tactile… elements” when if you touch anything, you put your hand through it because “Figments and Glamers… cannot support weight”? Don’t try the door, or cupboards, or stairs in a house made with mirage arcana, you’ll just go through them. Please, somebody tell me I’m just way off base, and am totally misinterpreting the rules; and if what you say is actually legal, I’ll fork over a cookie.

Remember kids, everytime you lead a gamer astray, Bionic Santa eats a puppy.

[Fwib]

Illusion can be anywhere from crazy-good to worthless depending on DM and circumstance - the rules and lack of them on how illusions work don't help, I guess.

[edit] [nitpick] Major image is a figment, not a glamer, and it doesn't have tactile components, but your point still stands for other spells.

[Agraham]

True, but figments and glamers have the same set of restrictions on effects. What happens when you mirage arcana an imaginary hill and tunnel system, and everyone fails their saves? What happens to the man who botched his save for a major image and knows he's submerged in lava, where the spell says it carries the illusion of thermal effects but at the same time "cannot cause damage to objects or creatures"?

Reading those subschools makes me see Mr. Tweet, Cook, and Williams lined up against a wall, speaking no rules, hearing no rules, and speaking no rules.

[Fwib]

How do you mean about the imaginary hill and tunnel system?

Illusion-up a hill full of tunnels in an otherwise empty area?

[tzor]

Looking at the SRD I noticed an important distinction, indeed a clever one. A figment is not a glamer and in some ways is the opposite of one.

"A figment spell creates a false sensation. Those who perceive the figment perceive the same thing, not their own slightly different versions of the figment."

"A glamer spell changes a subject’s sensory qualities, making it look, feel, taste, smell, or sound like something else, or even seem to disappear."

So let's take the case of the Mirage Arcana two story house. You approach what you perceive to be the stairs. You climb up the stairs. In fact you are not climbing up at all, you are simply thinking you are climbing up the stairs. Someone who doesn't climb up the stairs sees you going up the stairs because the spell is a glamer, not a figment and thus is more "subject" based.

[Crissa]

...And someone who didn't fail the save sees you going nowhere, but acting like you are, which means you took the train to crazy town ^-^ and they were left behind.

-Crissa

[Fwib]

Like in the Red Dwarf episode with

the despair squid

[tzor]

I'm also reminded of the holo-visors in Earth 2 where they literally had fancy parties where they were just walking around a barren flat plain with thier visors on.

[JonSetanta]

If one uses Major Image and says "I fill the spell area with exact duplicate clones of myself and hide among them" how would that work?

Why ever use Mirror Image?

[Catharz]

1185223410[/unixtime]]
Why ever use Mirror Image?

It doesn't require concentration.

[fbmf]

So if I Major Image a bridge, and a guy fails his save and walks on it, does he know he is actually falling to his death when he begins to fall, or does he think he's walking on the bridge and then suddenly he dies?

Game On,
fbmf

[Immortius]

To be honest, I thought tactile illusions fool people into thinking that they are putting weight onto them when they weren't - so even though they don't support weight and you could wave your hand through them if you knew they were illusions, someone who doesn't know could push them, etc.

So for the bridge case you could touch the railing, even tap the bridge with your foot, but you would fall as soon as you moved onto it.

But I'm not really familiar with the rules so that is more how I would do it than anything else.

Alternatively you would never actually step onto the bridge, only think you did, think you're walking across and then when you step off the other side actually find yourself back on the same side you started on (which you never really left).

[tzor]

1185223410[/unixtime]]If one uses Major Image and says "I fill the spell area with exact duplicate clones of myself and hide among them" how would that work?

It's like hiding in a house of wax where every figure is one of you. There is nothing in Major Image (note it says image, not images) that suggests you can make the image (which is a complex arrangement of images of you) move exactly as you are moving, nor is there any indication you can make them move relative to each other since technically they form one image. They only last three rounds after concentration (which if you are playing the part of the wax dummy should be easy) and there is a will disbelief meaning they all go POOF at once. (They are, I repeat ONE IMAGE.)

[Catharz]

1185266516[/unixtime]]So if I Major Image a bridge, and a guy fails his save and walks on it, does he know he is actually falling to his death when he begins to fall, or does he think he's walking on the bridge and then suddenly he dies?

Game On,
fbmf

He gets to walk out to the middle before falling, whereupon he realizes the illusion. It's a suspension of disbelief bridge.

[RandomCasualty]

1185266516[/unixtime]]So if I Major Image a bridge, and a guy fails his save and walks on it, does he know he is actually falling to his death when he begins to fall, or does he think he's walking on the bridge and then suddenly he dies?

Figments don't support weight, so as soon as the guy steps onto the bridge, he goes right through the floor and falls, this instantly determines that the bridge is an illusion (from his perspective).

Onlookers would see him fall through the bridge, though this wouldn't count as automatic disbelief for them. They would still have to interact with the illusion themselves to even get a save.

[Crissa]

How would he know the difference between a bridge that shattered under his weight and an illusion?

-Crissa

[Fwib]

*visions of Wile E Coyote*

[RandomCasualty]

1185321096[/unixtime]]How would he know the difference between a bridge that shattered under his weight and an illusion?

Well, assuming the caster tried to have the bridge react to his movement, such that it visually collapses, then theoretically the guy may not know. To do this it would need to be capable of producing tactile elements, but you could do that.

[Brobdingnagian]

Wouldn't that also require the caster to be there and alter the spell to create the necessary effects or, gods forbid, cast the spell once per visual frame of the victim's optic receptors?

On that note, how many frames per second does a Beholder get? Anyone?

I have to go with RC on this one. The logic centre of the human brain would automatically cause those who see the fall to believe the man simply fell through a hole. When they get there and touch the rail and don't see a hole... what happens? Do they get a second save on top of the one for interaction? Do they get a circumstance bonus? If they fail (one or two, however many need be done), then they would simply believe the clutz fell over the rail, I guess, despite having witnessed otherwise...

Does that make all figments into mind-affecting spells?

[MrWaeseL]

Illusions give me a headache

[cthulhu]

I appear to have posted and then had the post monsters eat my post.

Anyway what I was saying is that the eye is much closer to an LCD screen, in that it's a moving average of what you see -> hence those stupid spinning disc tricks and blur and stuff.

[Fwib]

1185362680[/unixtime]]I appear to have posted and then had the post monsters eat my post.

I get that sometimes.

[Crissa]

LCDs have two mods, active and passive. Active mode LCDs don't blur, but in fact change faster than we can see the change. Passive only change when the change has happened long enough to fill the buffer.

Anyhow...

...With magical items, a magically repairing bridge or an illusion over a hole in a bridge would be just as common (maybe moreso) than an entire bridge of illusion.

Disbelief is much tougher than you think it might be ^-^

-Crissa

[JonSetanta]

The key word here is 'interaction'. I assume that involves all senses, since senses are how we interact (with feedback) with our world.

If one sees someone fall through a bridge, clearly THROUGH and not OVER, I'd say automatic pass on the Will save.
Barring partial cover, far distance, or too much action going on for the viewer to have full attention to the faller, this should be a case of common sense over logic. Yes, logic fails. Sometimes.

[AlphaNerd]

If one sees someone fall through a bridge, clearly THROUGH and not OVER, I'd say automatic pass on the Will save.

No, you never automatically pass a will save. You may realize that it's an illusion, but knowing it's an illusion doesn't make the illusion go away.