Disappearing Act
Hello everyone, and welcome to another exciting edition of Obscure Arcana, where we bring you the latest and greatest new spells each week to set your casters up with even more exciting and fantastic spells. This week we’ve been celebrating the release of our book Character Guide: the Gentleman Thief with Thief Week. Of course, those of us who are dedicated wizards know that spells are rarely designed specifically to help us steal things. But I managed to track down an obscure tome filled a number of spells which are extremely handy at putting more gold in our pockets. Coincidentally, many of these spells are a low enough level to be used by rogues with the minor magic and major magic rogue talents.
Detect Gold
You can detect gold in the spell’s area. The spell only detects gold either in bulk or in the form of coins, and has no effect on other objects of value such as gems, silver, or magic items. The exact effects depend on how long you spend concentrating on the spell.
1st round: You become aware of the presence or absence of gold within the spell’s area.
2nd round: You become aware of the total amount of gold within the spell’s area: in the case of coins, you become aware of the number of coins; in the case of sources of gold other than coins, the amount is expressed in weight. Finally, if both coins and other bulk sources of gold are present, you become aware of both figures separately.
3rd round: You become aware of the locations of all the gold within the spell’s area, as well as the exact weight of each individual non-coin objects made of gold within the spell’s area.
While detect gold cannot be used to discover silver, copper or adamantine, clever mages have created identical spells for other forms of metal. In each case, the spell can only detect and discern a single type of metal. In the case of metals other than gold, a single coin of the chosen metal is substituted for the spell’s focus.
Detect Metal and Minerals
As the spell detect gold,except that up to three kinds of metals or specific minerals can be chosen when the spell is cast, and it detects objects of the chosen metal, instead of gold. Objects of different materials are easily differentiated by the caster, allowing him to easily distinguish which objects are made of which materials.
Discern Value
When you cast this spell, you immediately become aware of the exact gp value of the target object. The value perceived with this spell is equal to the item’s price, not the item’s cost and offers no special insight into the creation of the item. The spell not only reveals the item’s true price, but also reveals the average price that merchants within 1 mile of your location at the time of casting would be willing to pay for the item. Since the spell is not a window into the future, the value given by the spell does not necessarily reflect the amount of gold the character will receive for the item, as some people, such as a collector of similar items, may be willing to pay you a substantially higher price than a store owner bent on cheating his customers.
Flash-Bang
When you cast this spell, you create a bright light and an incredibly loud bang. Other creatures within the spell’s radius must succeed on a Will saving throw or become blinded and deafened for 1d4 rounds. Additionally, even creatures who succeed on their saving throws suffer a penalty equal to your caster level (to a maximum of -10 at 10th level) on all Perception checks for 1d4 rounds.
Hand of the Thief
When you cast this spell, you create an invisible copy of the hand used as a focus when casting this spell. As a move action, you can telepathically direct the hand, with several options to choose from. You may direct the hand to move (30-ft. fly speed with perfect maneuverability), or to use the Sleight of Hand skill, or to perform steal combat maneuvers, or to drop anything it is currently holding. The hand uses your skill modifier for any Sleight of Hand checks it makes, and your CMB for steal combat maneuvers it performs. In either case, the hand receives a bonus on all such checks equal to +1 for every 2 caster levels you possess. In the case of steal combat maneuvers, if you possess the feats Improved Steal and/or Greater Steal, the hand is treated as though it also had those feats. As normal, the hand cannot perform steal combat maneuvers if it is already holding an object.
The hand cannot perform any other actions, such as opening doors or chests. A hand of the thief has an AC of 15 and 10 hit points, and is constantly invisible, granting it all the benefits normally associated with that condition.
Negate Fall
When you cast this spell, you are protected from future falls. For the spell’s duration, whenever you would fall more than 10 feet, treat the fall as 10 feet shorter per caster level for the purposes of determining fall damage. This spell has no effect on any other feat, spell, or ability that references the distance of your fall, such as a trap that deals additional damage on impact based on the distance you fell.
Protection from Thieves
When you cast this spell, you protect all items in your possession from would-be thieves. You gain a bonus on Perception checks and on CMD versus steal combat maneuvers equal to your caster level (to a maximum of +20 at 20th level) for the spell’s duration.