Lost in Place

This spell is a part of the Time Ripple spell chain and is found in the Time Ripple rune stone.

There is a part of every living thing that tracks where it is in space. This is not done consciously, not deliberately, but constantly and automatically, the inner sense that says this is north and that is south and I am facing this way and moving that way. It is so fundamental that most people never notice it exists. They simply trust it, the way they trust their heartbeat, because it has never been wrong before. 

The posteramancer makes it wrong. Lost in Place is not confusion in the ordinary sense. The target is not simply disoriented or dazed or uncertain. The temporal distortion the posteramancer creates works specifically on that inner spatial sense - the part of the target that tracks direction - and pulls it out of sync with reality. The target's inner self insists they are facing north. They are facing east. The target is certain they are moving toward the enemy. They are moving toward their ally. The disconnect between what the target knows to be true about their position and what is actually true is total and completely convincing.

Each round the target must make an Impossible Insight check to pierce the distortion long enough to act with any accuracy. Should they fail, and failing is likely, the direction of their action is determined by rolling a 1d4: 1 = north, 2 = west, 3 = east, 4 = south. They strike in that direction, face that direction, move that direction, regardless of what is there. An ally standing to the west has exactly as much cause for concern as an enemy standing to the north. The target is not lost in the world. They are lost in themselves, which is considerably harder to find your way out of.