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So my group recently defeated a mummy lord and learned a bit too late that they had to find his heart and destroy it. The heart "got away" and they spent a few sessions tracking it down again and having a pretty tough fight with the new guardian for the heart. For reasons I won't get into here, the guardian was holding the heart in a kind of stasis that didn't break until the guardian was defeated, so the mummy lord was on the verge, but not quite, about to reform.

Because the fight was so tough, the group decided to punt on dealing with the heart and stuff it into a bag of holding, figuring that even if the mummy lord reformed, he couldn't just waltz out.

I did decide that the mummy lord could reform in the bag of holding, fwiw, based on the monster description. Because the party decided to wait awhile before dealing with him again, I also decided he had enough time to refresh his spell list and use Planar Ally to ask for a patron for some assistance in escaping the bag, which the patron provided.

Was this a legitimate call on my part? The party thought it was pretty hilarious for what it's worth, but I don't want to have cheated them for what was a pretty clever idea.

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    \$\begingroup\$ What kind of assistance did the patron provide? \$\endgroup\$ – Rubiksmoose♦ Feb 8 at 22:54
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    \$\begingroup\$ He asked for the patron to cast Teleport to a safe location in exchange for some plot-interesting items that may come into play later if the group keeps pursuing him. \$\endgroup\$ – Jason Whitish Feb 8 at 23:42
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    \$\begingroup\$ @Rubiksmoose That seemed a better alternative than Banishment (which presumably would have just put him next to the bag of holding...and he assumed the party was at full strength). \$\endgroup\$ – Jason Whitish Feb 8 at 23:57
  • \$\begingroup\$ Who's the patron, btw? \$\endgroup\$ – Miniman Feb 9 at 4:56
  • \$\begingroup\$ @Miniman Tiamat. The mummy lord is a dragonborn in service to an ancient red dracolich. \$\endgroup\$ – Jason Whitish Feb 9 at 13:19
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That's not what Planar Ally does.

That entity sends a celestial, an elemental, or a fiend loyal to it to aid you, making the creature appear in an unoccupied space within range.

Now, depending on who the patron was, they may have been able to send a creature capable of getting the mummy lord out of the bag. For example, Tiamat might send a blue abishai (Mordenkainen's Tome of Foes, pg. 161), a spellcasting dragon (Monster Manual, pg. 86), or even hire an arcanaloth (Monster Manual, pg. 312) armed with the appropriate spells to enact an escape. But the patron can't just get the mummy lord out of the bag themselves.

Note that, if Planar Ally allowed the entity to act themselves, there would be no need for the Cleric's Divine Intervention ability, since Planar Ally is on the Cleric spell list anyway.

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  • \$\begingroup\$ Oh that's a shame...we could have had a lot of fun with that option. Reading fail on my part; it's the first time we've had characters/monsters with such high spell levels. \$\endgroup\$ – Jason Whitish Feb 9 at 13:20
  • \$\begingroup\$ @JasonWhitish I added a note on Tiamat. And yeah, it's a bit of a spoilsport answer. \$\endgroup\$ – Miniman Feb 9 at 13:45

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