Spell: Dunning–Kruger Invocation

Dunning–Kruger Invocation

Enchantment (Compulsion) [Mind-Affecting]

Level: Bard 3, Sorcerer/Wizard 4, Cleric 4 (Knowledge domain)
Components: V, S
Casting Time: 1 standard action
Range: Close (25 ft. + 5 ft./2 levels)
Target: One living creature
Duration: 1 day/level (D)
Saving Throw: Will negates
Spell Resistance: Yes

Description

You infect the target’s mind with a crippling distortion of self-perception, causing them to dramatically overestimate their competence while simultaneously eroding their actual understanding. The subject becomes supremely confident in their abilities - especially where they are least capable.

Effects

Upon failing its saving throw, the target selects (or the caster designates) one Knowledge skill, Profession, Craft, or any one skill in which the target has fewer than 5 ranks. This becomes the affected domain.

The target suffers the following effects:

• Takes a –6 penalty on all checks with the affected skill.
• Gains a +4 morale bonus on Bluff, Intimidate, and Diplomacy checks when asserting competence in that skill.
• May attempt untrained checks with the affected skill even if normally prohibited.

Cognitive Distortion

The target is convinced of their expertise and cannot willingly accept that they are mistaken:

• The target automatically believes they succeeded on any failed check involving the affected skill unless the failure has immediate, undeniable consequences (DM’s discretion).
• Any creature attempting to correct or advise the target must succeed on a Diplomacy check opposed by the target’s Bluff check or be dismissed as ignorant.

Escalation (Overconfidence Spiral)

Each time the target fails a check with the affected skill, they must make a secondary Will save:

• Failure: The penalty increases by –2 (cumulative, maximum –10), and the morale bonus increases by +1 (maximum +6).
• Success: No change.

Moment of Doubt (Suppression Clause)

If the target is confronted with overwhelming, undeniable failure (such as catastrophic consequences directly tied to the skill), they may attempt a new Will save with a +4 bonus:

• Success: The spell is suppressed for 1 hour.
• Failure: The target instead rationalizes the failure, immediately triggering the Escalation effect.

Special

• Creatures with 5 or more ranks in the affected skill gain a +2 bonus on their initial saving throw.
• Creatures with 0 ranks in the affected skill take a –2 penalty on the save.
• If cast on a creature already suffering penalties to Wisdom, increase the spell DC by +1.

Material Component (Optional Flavor)

A fragment of chalk or a scrap of poorly written notes, crushed during casting.

Lore

Though now regarded as a malicious enchantment, Dunning–Kruger Invocation is widely believed to have originated in the lecture halls of The Fraternity of the Veiled Quill, an order of mages devoted to the study of knowledge, rhetoric, and intellectual humility. Early records suggest the spell was first developed as a pedagogical tool - a controlled means of demonstrating the dangers of overconfidence to novice apprentices. By allowing students to experience the illusion of mastery firsthand, instructors hoped to instill a deeper respect for disciplined study and self-awareness.

The spell is most commonly attributed to the rival arcanists Archmage Dunning and Magister Kruger, whose infamous collaboration has become the subject of academic legend. Dunning, a meticulous theoretician, was obsessed with the limits of mortal cognition, while Kruger was a sharp-tongued lecturer known for publicly humiliating overconfident students. Together, they devised the enchantment after a series of increasingly bitter disputes with apprentices who believed themselves more knowledgeable than their masters. Ironically, surviving correspondence suggests that each wizard believed the other to be the lesser intellect - leading some historians to speculate that the spell’s creation may itself have been influenced by its own principle.

Over time, the spell escaped its academic origins. Rival scholars began using it in debates, subtly unraveling their opponents’ credibility by causing them to speak with unwarranted certainty on subjects they poorly understood. In political courts and noble salons, the spell found new life as a weapon of social sabotage - courtiers enchanted with it would confidently offer disastrous advice, misinterpret critical information, or undermine their own authority before key audiences. Entire careers have been quietly ended under its influence, with victims rarely understanding what went wrong.

Among experienced arcanists, the spell is both feared and grudgingly respected. It serves as a reminder that ignorance alone is rarely dangerous - it is the illusion of competence that leads to catastrophe. Some masters still employ a moderated version of the enchantment in advanced training, forcing students to confront the limits of their understanding. Yet even they warn that repeated exposure carries risks, as the mind can grow accustomed to its own false certainties. In rare cases, those subjected to the spell too often begin to exhibit its effects even in the absence of magic - a condition some grimly refer to as “true enlightenment’s shadow.”

Spell: Indelicate Transposition

 

Indelicate Transposition

Conjuration (Teleportation)

Level: Sorcerer/Wizard 4
Components: V, S, M, F (optional)
Casting Time: 10 minutes
Range: Touch
Effect: One magical sigil or glyph
Duration: Permanent until discharged
Saving Throw: Will negates (see text)
Spell Resistance: Yes

Description

You inscribe an invisible, magically reactive sigil upon a surface or object. The sigil remains dormant until a specified condition is met, at which point it immediately activates.

When triggered, the spell targets the offending creature and applies the following effects:

• The subject is teleported to a fixed destination designated at the time of casting. This location must be on the same plane, within 1 mile per caster level, and must be a place the caster has personally visited.
• The subject arrives 10 feet above the nearest stable surface at the destination and immediately falls. This can include stone, sand or even water.
• All worn and carried items (including clothing, armor, and held gear) are removed and left on the ground nearest the fixed destination where they can be found by the target of the spell. These items land harmlessly and remain where they fall.
• The subject is dazed for 1 round upon arrival.

Trigger Condition

At the time of casting, you define a specific triggering condition, such as:

• Removing an item from a protected area
• Opening a container
• Crossing a boundary

The condition must be clear and observable. The sigil affects only the creature that triggers it.

Saving Throw and DC Scaling

The saving throw DC is calculated as normal:

DC = 10 + spell level + caster’s Intelligence modifier

Because this spell is bound to a fixed location and conditional trigger, creatures attempting a saving throw take the following penalties:

• –2 penalty on the Will save due to the spell’s anchored nature
• –4 penalty if the triggering action is performed knowingly in violation of the ward’s condition (such as deliberate theft)

These penalties stack.

Casters may increase the save DC through normal means, including but not limited to:

• Preparing the spell in a higher-level slot via metamagic (such as Heighten Spell)
• Feats such as Spell Focus (Conjuration) and Greater Spell Focus
• Increasing Intelligence through level advancement or magical enhancement

Material Component

A small engraved silver token worth 25 gp, attuned to the destination. The token is consumed during casting.

Focus (Optional) - Arcane Anchor

An arcane anchor is a specially prepared object worth at least 100 gp, placed at the intended destination.

If a focus is used:

• The destination must be within 10 feet above the anchor
• The caster must place the anchor personally at the destination
• The anchor is not consumed and remains in place

When an anchor is present:

• The teleportation is precisely fixed, and the subject arrives directly above the anchor point
• The subject takes an additional –1 penalty on the Will save

If the anchor is moved or destroyed, the sigil becomes inert until the spell is recast.

Lore

Among the merchants and mages of Ville des Marai, few spells are as widely recognized - or as widely feared - as Indelicate Transposition.

The spell is most commonly attributed to Kelwyn, proprietor of Kelwyn’s Emporium, whose protective magic has become something of a local legend. In his earlier years, Kelwyn is said to have relied on more conventional arcane defenses - wards of flame, lightning, and annihilation. These proved effective, but ultimately unsatisfying. Ash left no witnesses, and fear born only of rumor had a tendency to fade.

What emerged instead was a different philosophy of protection.

The first widely recounted use of this spell involved a would-be thief, a display case, and an abrupt, unclothed arrival above the rushing waters of the Rivière Tumultueuse. The man survived. More importantly, he returned to the city - cold, humiliated, and very talkative.

From that point on, Kelwyn’s reputation ceased to rely on what might happen to thieves, and instead on what had.

“A dead thief is a solved problem,” Kelwyn is rumored to have said. “A humiliated thief is a message.”

Since then, variations of Indelicate Transposition have spread well beyond his shop, studied and replicated by mages who appreciate its particular elegance. The spell does not destroy, nor does it permanently harm. Instead, it separates intent from outcome with surgical precision - removing the offender from the scene, divesting them of ill-gotten gains, and depositing them somewhere memorable.

Reports from across the region describe victims appearing in fountains, alleyways, rooftops, and riverbanks - often at inconvenient heights, and almost never with their dignity intact. Their belongings, meanwhile, are typically found waiting at the destination, as though the spell itself expects the lesson to conclude with retrieval rather than loss.

Scholars occasionally debate whether such magic is more humane than lethal wards, or merely more theatrical in its cruelty. Few dispute its effectiveness.

Those who experience Indelicate Transposition rarely require a second lesson.

And in certain circles, a final refinement of Kelwyn’s method is quietly repeated:

“If I wished you dead, you would not be wet.”

Feat - Resist Intimidation

Weather it's bravery, apathy, empathy or just outright stupidity, you are highly resistant to anyone attempting to intimidate you through any means.

Benefit: The DC to intimidate you is 4 higher than normal, and this applies to any and all forms of intimidation.

Yes, you're quite scary (yawn)

Feat - Perfect Shot

Your skill with ranged weapons is so great now that you can not only fire into melee, you don't have to ever worry about hitting an ally, even on a fumble.

Benefit: If an attack would accidentally hit an ally, the result is simply rerolled until a different result is obtained. You can also never hit yourself with a ranged attack.

Prerequisite: Improved Precise Shot

Feat - Socially Shrewd

You're very good at guessing what drives a person.

Benefit: The PC gains a +4 bonus to Sense Motive skill checks.

“A cunning fox is better than a senseless leopard.”

Feat - Empower the Dead

When you create undead, they are much more powerful than normal and can now move with exceptional speed.

Benefit: When you animate a skeleton or zombie, they will have max HP and a normal Move of 30` with the ability to run.
Normal: Skeletons normally have 6 hp and a move of 30', and zombies normally have 16 hp and a move of 30'. Now human skeletons will have 12 hp, zombies will have 27 and both can take a run action.

Feat - Necromantic Charisma

You innately understand how to control undead, and are able to control more than is normally allowed.

Benefit: You can now control up to 8 HD per caster level.

Normal: Animate dead states that the caster can control 4 HD per caster level of undead.