Fun With Stone to Flesh

[Ridureyu]

Ah, Stone to Flesh. Is this spell even in 4E? It should be. Here is something designed for one specific use - restoring petrified PCs - but that changed dramatically when people realized it should have wider-reaching implications. Flesh to Stone works on all flesh, right? So shouldn't Stone to Flesh work on all stone? Therefore, has anybody else seen the limitless (and gory) possibilities for this spell? In fact, if you have, post them!

For the sake of argument, I am also going to assume that an epic caster is allowed to make Epic Stone to Flesh for the larger-scale "transformations."



1. The party will never run out of rations, but there will be odd pock marks in the landscape.

2. At first the king was never going to allow us back in his castle again, but it turned out that his castle made great bacon.

3. A solution to the Tomb of Horrors that allows for no loss of PC life, and is mighty tasty. Acererak's lair may be ruined, but the villagers will never go hungry again!

4. The Fat Mines of Schmaltzberg are now part of the campaign.

5. Statue of David. Horror.

6. The Goliath Barbarian's obsidian greatsword is now very floppy, and very disturbing.

7. Holy crap, that poor Roper.

8. Holy crap, that poor Xorn.

9. The world is no longer Eberron, or Krynn, or Faerun, or Greyhawk. it is now Spamland.

10. "I eat the golem."

11. That will forever be known as the day the streets sagged into the sewers.

12. "AAAGH! What did you DO to that Slaughterstone Eviscerator? I mean... the metal... the stone bits... the blades... AAAAGH!"

13. Stone giants in disguise!

14. It's no longer a Galeb Duhr, now it's MODOK!

15. "For what you did to his temple, Pelor smites you all. Really hard."

16. Hamburgers fall, everybody dies.

[Sstoopidtallkid]

17: Half-White Dragon Half-Golem Half-Red Dragon Half-Demon Half-Blue Dragon Green Dragon corpse. And a lot of Onyx.

[Avilan the Grey]

18.1: Golems taste like chicken.

18.2: Chicken tastes like golem.

19: ...Ok who turned the valuable jade statue into jerky?

[chiasaur11]

20) Wall of stone becomes wall of delicious Bacon.

21) Bacon makes excellent diplomacy aids.

[Pharaoh's Fist]

Ah, Stone to Flesh. Is this spell even in 4E?
Is it fun? Useful? Potentially exploitable?

THEN NO!
:smalltongue:

[Ridureyu]

Is it fun? Useful? Potentially exploitable?

THEN NO!

I've already found some fun, useful, and potentially exploitable things to do in 4E. Please do not turn this into an Edition War/4E-bashing/D&D is dying thread. We have enough of those.

ANYWAY


22. It's just like Indiana Jones, only with a meatball.

23. The magic amulet was ruined forever.

24. Although it kept its stats, nobody ever touched the +5 dagger ever again.

25. Same thing with the wand.

[Tempest Fennac]

I remember one person mentioning using the spell for the purpose of altering people who are petrified, as well as other people mentioning using it to give people more arms.

[daggaz]

Tried to think of some more funny uses, but most of it has been repeatedly hit upon in this thread..

So my inner DM starts thinking ok..whats wrong with this picture.

First thing, looking at the spell description and thinking of the king's castle of rancid bacon (hahahaha!), I was shocked to find that it has medium range!! :smallannoyed: This spell should really be touch use, only. For many, many reasons, fluff issues being just the beginning.

Next, hitting up metal and obsidian with it... umm.. no. Hate to kill catgirls, but those objects, while found naturally in the realm of minerals, are significantly different from common stone of any type. Its easy enough to meld those differences into gameworld fluff. Refined metals and glass simply have different magically reactive properties than everyday stone. Otherwise this spell is way too overreaching.

Finally, using this spell to graft new arms, create new life, etc.. I would allow this as a DM, but it would be incredibly difficult. The spell creates a fleshy, tho inert and lifeless, substance. It really makes me think of just a big hunk of nonliving muscle and nothing else. No fat, no organs, no nervous or circulatory system, no skin, just muscle unending. You need some serious extra mojo to get it up and moving.

In the explicit case of the stone golem, there has been a significant investment in magically animating the hunk of stone, so its ok that the flesh gob can move around too as a flesh golem.

If you want to turn a statue into a living creature tho?? Well, you could use this spell to turn it to flesh, and then follow the golem creation rules to make a flesh golem. Or if you want it sentient, you could use a soul gem and some pretty evil magic to make some kind of abomination which would be an affront to true life. But to bring a statue to true life?? Sorry, but you are going to need two wishes. One to change the statue into a true (albeight dead) body, complete with everything it needs to function in real life, and another wish to infuse it with the soul of a willing creature, alive or dead. Stone to flesh just isnt going to cut it there.

Likewise with creating extra arms, unless you are playing with golems.. (half golem template, damn you and your cheese, you are forever banned from use by PCs).

[erikun]

Yes, you can turn basic stone into flesh with the spell. And yes, it does just turn into lumpy flesh - which is edible. I don't think the spell specifies what flesh, though, so enjoy your bacon. :smallbiggrin:

Also, it generally makes just basic flesh, not working organs - so a flesh statue is just sculpted meat, not a person. There's nothing stopping you from casting Animate Objects on it, though, and freaking out the locals. :smallamused:

[Ridureyu]

You'd also totally make that Pygmalion story come true.


Actually, there's an idea. Someone uses a combination of those spells to bring the Venus de Milo statue to life, because he thinks that it is the zenith of true beauty...


...Venus then screams, falls over, and bleeds out from her ragged arm sockets.

[erikun]

"You just killed a work of art!"

Actually, with some interpretation of the Mud to Stone and Stone to Flesh spells, you could turn something like the Terracotta Army (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Terracotta_Army) into an actual army - or with the reverse, have an actual army lying in wait for the trigger to return them to normal.

[Heliomance]

Yes, you can turn basic stone into flesh with the spell. And yes, it does just turn into lumpy flesh - which is edible. I don't think the spell specifies what flesh, though, so enjoy your bacon. :smallbiggrin:

Also, it generally makes just basic flesh, not working organs - so a flesh statue is just sculpted meat, not a person. There's nothing stopping you from casting Animate Objects on it, though, and freaking out the locals. :smallamused:

Actually a statue explicitly becomes a corpse IIRC.

[Random832]

Actually a statue explicitly becomes a corpse IIRC.

That's fluff. It's not really the DM's problem if the "for example" doesn't really fit the rule text.


The spell also can convert a mass of stone into a fleshy substance. Such flesh is inert and lacking a vital life force unless a life force or magical energy is available. (For example, this spell would turn a stone golem into a flesh golem, but an ordinary statue would become a corpse.)

i.e. whoever wrote this assumed that "a corpse" is an appropriate description for "a lump of meat shaped like a person"

[Draxonicar]

Raise Dead on the bacon!

[AslanCross]

That's fluff. It's not really the DM's problem if the "for example" doesn't really fit the rule text.

i.e. whoever wrote this assumed that "a corpse" is an appropriate description for "a lump of meat shaped like a person"

It can get pretty ridiculous if it actually did become a corpse.

0. Be a 15th level caster with 10 ranks in Knowledge (Religion).
1. Sculpt a bugbear statue.
2. Stone to flesh
3. Perform create undead on the bugbear corpse.

You have just created a Bonedrinker, which is a pretty powerful creature to get from a block of stone.

[Yuki Akuma]

...Well yeah but you're 15th level. You could just go out and kill a bugbear far more easily.

[shadow_archmagi]

Isn't there a spell that allows you to shape stone, though?

[Yuki Akuma]

Isn't there a spell that allows you to shape stone, though?

Remarkably called Stone Shape.

[Tengu_temp]

Finally, using this spell to graft new arms, create new life, etc.. I would allow this as a DM, but it would be incredibly difficult. The spell creates a fleshy, tho inert and lifeless, substance. It really makes me think of just a big hunk of nonliving muscle and nothing else. No fat, no organs, no nervous or circulatory system, no skin, just muscle unending. You need some serious extra mojo to get it up and moving.


A long time has passed since the primary use of StF was to turn the victims of petrification back...

[ImmortalAer]

Make a pit. Make it a pit trap. Make it cast Stone to Flesh on the bottom as the PC's are falling. They sink into the fleshy mass, bursting it open and drowning in blood. Seriously macabre.

[AslanCross]

...Well yeah but you're 15th level. You could just go out and kill a bugbear far more easily.

An entire tribe, even.

Still, it's something one could do if he really wanted to. And I'm sure someone can find a way to automate the process and profit from it.

...Ugh. Tippy-style stone shape trap.

[Draxonicar]

Make a pit. Make it a pit trap. Make it cast Stone to Flesh on the bottom as the PC's are falling. They sink into the fleshy mass, bursting it open and drowning in blood. Seriously macabre.

Better yet, Cast raise dead on the mass as and have the morbid, putrid bleeding thing of meat devour them whole!

[Yuki Akuma]

Better yet, Cast raise dead on the mass as and have the morbid, putrid bleeding thing of meat devour them whole!

But it was never alive.

Try Animate Object.

[Draxonicar]

But it was never alive.

Try Animate Object.

If we're going by the "the lump of meat is a corpse theory" it is, thats a good idea... hehh...throw in "awaken" on it and watch it rage at the world

[Androgeus]

Better yet, Cast raise dead on the mass as and have the morbid, putrid bleeding thing of meat devour them whole!

some sort of fleshy cousin of the Gelatinous Cube?

[AslanCross]

some sort of fleshy cousin of the Gelatinous Cube?

There's actually something like that in MM2. The Flesh Jelly. It's basically a giant living pimple.

[Evil the Cat]

Wall of Stone + Stone to Flesh = Wall of flesh. Yay meatwall!

Some combinations can get very silly.

I think I remember one time with a wizard, we were in a tunnel system in a mountain, and I was out of passwall and stone shape. I Told the party "I have a way past this wall, but you probably won't like it." "Really? What?" "I can turn it into meat, and you can carve your way through it fairly easily." The rest of the party stared at me for a moment before I got the ewwww response.

Ultimately, they passed, because "that's just too gross."

[Kris Strife]

Hm... Can you specify what kind of meat it turns into? If I carved a steak, used stone to flesh, grilled the steak and ate it, would it taste like steak or mystery meat?

[Decoy Lockbox]

Don't forget ye olde classicks of yore:

In 1/2e AD&D, you could transmute sticks into stone using:

sticks to snakes,
then flesh to stone on the snakes,
giving you a collection of kickass stone snakes to peddle at ye olde faire.

[13_CBS]

Hm... Can you specify what kind of meat it turns into? If I carved a steak, used stone to flesh, grilled the steak and ate it, would it taste like steak or mystery meat?

Depending on whether or not "flesh" also means "fat and other components of delicious steak", it might turn out to be a bit too lean and untasty.