[RPG] Do Dimensional Shackles block all kinds of teleportation, or only extraplanar teleportation

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The following part of the description of Dimensional Shackles seems a bit ambiguous to me :

the shackles prevent a creature bound by them from using any method of extradimensional movement, including teleportation or travel to a different plane of existence.

What gives me pause here is whether the “prevents… teleportation” is to be read as “prevents (only) teleportation to a different plane”, or “prevents (all kinds of) teleportation (, as well as travel to a different plane)”.

Which one is it ?

(I’m asking because a fellow DM said that teleportation would not be blocked if the shackles’ target wishes to teleport within the same plane)

Best Answer

All teleportation

Essentially the main purpose of dimensional shackles is to restrain not just any regular person, but specifically a caster or other creature that is able to teleport. Regular shackles would not effectively hold such a creature, since the creature might just be able to cast misty step or dimension door (both of which only have verbal components) to teleport away from the area and then have someone free them. (It would be especially difficult to hold a sorcerer without such shackles, since their Subtle Spell metamagic allows them to spend a sorcery point to cast a spell without needing the verbal or somatic components.)

In addition, I don't think travel to other planes is generally considered "teleportation". For instance, plane shift uses the word "transported":

You and up to eight willing creatures who link hands in a circle are transported to a different plane of existence.

And blink uses the terms "appear", "vanish", and "return":

you vanish from your current plane of existence and appear in the Ethereal Plane [...] you return to an unoccupied space

As such, the intended interpretation seems likely to be that it blocks all teleportation, and also blocks travel to a different plane of existence; both of these are ostensibly considered "method[s] of extradimensional movement". The one exception specified in the description of the dimensional shackles is:

They don't prevent the creature from passing through an interdimensional portal.

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