[RPG] Are elementals immune to sight-based petrification effects in D&D 3.5E

As written, contingency triggers as soon as its condition is true, not as soon as the caster is aware that it is true. Neither caster’s senses, nor anyone else’s senses, are involved: it just happens. The spell changes the fundamental laws of the universe such that the next time X happens, spell Y is cast.

So the question isn’t about who knows, it’s about what is fact. Going down the list:

 1. tell time?

Contingency certainly seems to be capable of responding to certain times (time of day, time since an event); the tricky part here is establishing the condition clearly. Many settings don’t have rigorously-defined times, so it’s not clear that “6 PM” is going to mean anything in-character. On a globe, time zone issues can also be problems. But something like “noon at Town” seems likely to work.

 2. read minds?

The open-ended nature of the spell leaves that conceivable, but I’d go with “no,” largely on the basis that personal thoughts are not “facts of the universe” and detecting another’s thoughts requires a Saving Throw. Contingency does not have a built-in read thoughts.

 3. predict the future?

Similar to how I feel about reading minds: predicting the future requires special, powerful, and uncertain magic. The future is not a fact, not yet, and so contingency cannot be triggered by it.

 4. penetrate disguises?

If the disguise included some form of hiding from magic (nondetection), then no, but a simple mundane disguise would not affect contingency.

 5. discern the morality of actions?

Magic can detect alignment without giving the subject a Saving Throw. Somehow, alignment is an objective observable reality. So things like “a creature of Evil alignment” and an “Evil action” could probably be valid. Whether or not alignment is the same as morality is debatable and beyond the scope of this question.

 6. employ senses the subject lacks?

Contingency doesn’t “sense” per se; it just automatically reacts to facts. So, basically, the subject’s lack of a particular sense doesn’t come into play.

 7. determine other creatures' intents?

Same deal as thoughts; probably not.

 8. hear or see things the subject can't?

Same as 6; it doesn’t “hear” or “see” but can certainly react to facts that the subject cannot hear or see.

 9. know if the subject's been robbed even if the subject doesn't?

Yes.

 10. otherwise be triggered by information the subject doesn't or even couldn't have?

The subject doesn’t come into play; it’s more about what “magic” could have the information. Protected information (e.g. stuff magic would require a failed Saving Throw to get) I’ll call unavailable, but even that might be wishful thinking on my part.

In short, contingency is horribly-broken as written. You can try to rein it in by houseruling in some limitations, but I’m not convinced they’ll be enough. The spell is almost-certainly the most powerful that Wizards ever wrote.

As for the timing of simultaneous events, the rules don’t really handle that well. Presumably you could just use whoever’s player declared the action first, but in the case of purely-reactive contingencies, both could be triggered by the same fact and therefore be “simultaneous.” For creatures’ actions, I’d consider houseruling an expansion of Initiative to use opposed Initiative checks in such cases. But contingency is not a creature and once cast, it doesn’t have anything to do with the creature it’s been cast on until it triggers a spell on that character. I think perhaps the best solution is to use opposed Caster Level checks?

3.5 elves are both woodsy and civilized, wild and cultured.

Elves are short and slim, pale-skinned with dark hair and green eyes (but no facial hair). Elves "trance" instead of sleep, and they live more than 700 years.

But the 3.5 PHB1 reveals a fundamental problem with elves which just gets worse as the edition continued to talk about them in other books. D&D elves draw on two primary sources: Tolkien and the Child ballads (though it's likely that the Child influence is mostly filtered through a handful of secondary sources). These two notions of elfness conflict, and so D&D elves are peaceful, but warlike. They are close to nature, but highly civilized. They have a broad perspective and rarely experience extreme emotions, but they respond to insults with violence.

This vision of elves is schizophrenic, totally different depending on who's writing them and just plain hard to nail down, so 4e wisely split them into two races. I'll mention the drow as well, for completeness and because their history is tied to the origin of elves.

Please keep in mind, though, that the 4e Points of Light setting is not firmly established. You will find variations and even contradictions in the lore depending on what you read where; they deliberately muck about a bit with continuity, because ultimately such things are in the hands of the GM. What follows is my understanding of the general history, based on trying to piece together disparate conflicting sources.

Eladrin are the Tolkien-like High Elves and drow are their disowned relations.

Civilized and regal and aloof, innately attuned to the arcane arts, eladrin are the flagship race of the Feywild. When the dark goddess Lolth rebelled against the other two Feywild gods, a group of eladrin joined her side in the ensuing war. Lolth lost, and her followers were cast out. They moved into the Underdark and became the dark-skinned, insane, spider-worshipping drow.

Eladrin are slim, often fair, with hair in pale metallic colors, pupil-less eyes in vibrant cool colors, and pointy ears. They have no facial hair and little body hair, and stand about as tall as humans. Eladrin "trance" instead of sleep, and they usually live over 300 years.

The elf is the eladrin's hillbilly cousin.

During and after this war, many eladrin left the Feywild entirely and settled in the Mortal/Material Plane. After generations, they became elves: closer to nature and slightly shorter-lived than their eladrin brethren (though neither race lives nearly so long as the 3.5 elf), they are hunstmen and craftsmen. Elves live in trees instead of spires and are more associated with primal magic than with the arcane arts.

Elves are slender, with tan and brown skin colors. Their hair comes in the colors of the leaves in autumn. Like eladrin, they have pointy ears, no facial hair, cool-colored eyes (though they have pupils), and are about as tall as humans. Elves sleep like humans do, and they usually live at least 200 years.