what would ruptured cells do to a creature

[awa]

I'm working on a home brew system and I have a subset of water magic that damages by rupturing cells in the targets body now my question is besides damge what would that do to a living target to have a bunch of its cell burst.
I'm looking for a logical status effect id rather not use fatigue becuase another water spell group already uses it.

Right now im favoring a chance for con damge

[GenghisDon]

sicken

death

[Doxkid]

Depends on where. Two major things you'd probably like are:

-Organ failure
-Spreading necrosis of tissue

From that you get:
*Sickened effect
*Custom Disease
*Fatigued effect
*Blindness effect
*Deafness effect
*Ongoing Bleeding damage
*Con damage
*Strength damage
*Dex damage
*Stunned effect
*Being forced to make a save VS Withered Limb
*Suffocation
*Spontaneous Drowning
*Penalty to fort and reflex saves
*persistent nonlethal damage
...

[Slipperychicken]

How many are we talking here? Either way, the creature ought to get a Fort save negates.


If it's not-immediately-lethal amounts, Sicken/Nauseate (nauseate being much more brutal, obviously) is the usual way to represent such ailments. Plus, creatures without discernable anatomies are already immune to those conditions, so no nonsense with exploding an Ooze's cells.

If it's kill-you-on-the-spot amounts, 1d4 or 1d6 Con damage is powerful (scales with level, too), but not game-shattering. I point you toward Poison (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/poison.htm) as a possible benchmark.


EDIT: As far as I know, cells aren't really a thing in dnd. So it's really murky territory here.

[awa]

its only some of the cells of course the basic system ive been using for other spells of this type is damge +status condition or stat damge negates the status condition

[killianh]

well you can gauge the kind of damage doable by the spells that already exist. Avasculate for example does a flat 1\2 your hp, no save, followed by a Fort save to not be stunned. There's another that does 1d6/level by drying you out.

Rupturing cells can either do straight damage, stat damage, or some kind of impedement like sicken, stunned, bleed damage, etc. Another way to look at it is you could use water magic to break cells to force them to split (quickening natural regeneration) or use it to re-order the cells a la polymorph.

For balance though look at the Wu-Jen watch spell list. Focus on any debuff or straight damage spells to gauge the power levels of whatever spells you design

[Jeff the Green]

I assume this is by forcing water into their cells? Then this is going to be similar to the symptoms of hyponatremia:

nausea and vomiting, headache, confusion, lethargy, fatigue, appetite loss, restlessness and irritability, muscle weakness, spasms, or cramps, seizures, and decreased consciousness or coma.
(strikethrough is symptoms directly due to sodium deficiency, not cytolysis/swelling).

So I'd agree that, depending on the level of the spell, we're looking at sickness, nausea, Constitution damage, or death.

If you want to please the biology geeks, make plants immune (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turgor_Pressure).

[Reluctance]

Do not do this. Seriously, don't. Not only are you opening the door to science debates and sciencey tricks being pulled against you (anti-osmium, anybody?), you're also setting explicit precedent for creating/teleporting things inside living creatures. You see those rules about not conjuring anything inside of a living creature or into a space that can't support it? They're there for an explicit reason. Not one you want to go back on.

[Deophaun]

Do not do this. Seriously, don't. Not only are you opening the door to science debates and sciencey tricks being pulled against you (anti-osmium, anybody?), you're also setting explicit precedent for creating/teleporting things inside living creatures. You see those rules about not conjuring anything inside of a living creature or into a space that can't support it? They're there for an explicit reason. Not one you want to go back on.
Except there are spells that explicitly do allow the teleportation of water/substances into another (specific trumps general)... and I'm sure someone will post an example before I finish diving through the books to find one... :smallbiggrin:

Bah, that didn't take long: drown. Spell Compendium. Level 6 spell. Does exactly what create water says it can't do.

Also, to a lesser degree, thalassemia in Stormwrack turns the victim's blood into sea water.

This spell is not treading any new ground.

[ericgrau]

(strikethrough is symptoms directly due to sodium deficiency, not cytolysis/swelling).
I'd say most of the rest are too, maybe every single one. Sodium is also necessary for neuron and muscle function. They simply need it to fire. Side note: most processed food is (over)salted. But if you prepare your own or avoid sodium too religiously, getting a full spoonful of salt each day is important to avoid lethargy.

Rupturing cells would destroy those cells which would be the same as any other internal damage. You could call it hp damage or whatever other effect you think internal injury would have: con or w/e. Because high level toughness and training can't protect against it well, I might lean towards con damage.

[Ravens_cry]

Some Con damage and some HP damage does sound like a good fit without becoming overpowered.

[killianh]

Some Con damage and some HP damage does sound like a good fit without becoming overpowered.

yeah, it looks like when it becomes a baleful polymorph or rearrangement of things inside is when it becomes broken, like most of the broken stuff in D&D: if it doesn't add/minus from health/stats its usually powerful

[Eldan]

Except there are spells that explicitly do allow the teleportation of water/substances into another (specific trumps general)... and I'm sure someone will post an example before I finish diving through the books to find one... :smallbiggrin:

Bah, that didn't take long: drown. Spell Compendium. Level 6 spell. Does exactly what create water says it can't do.

Also, to a lesser degree, thalassemia in Stormwrack turns the victim's blood into sea water.

This spell is not treading any new ground.

Extract Water Elemental is a really fun one, from spell Compendium. It does about the opposite of what the OP describes, though. It rips water from the target's body and animates it as as an elemental.

[awa]

in regards to healing this is not very precise breaking things is easy fixing them is much harder.

being able to destroy some of a targets tissue is not going to break the game

i think a small amount of con damge save negates+ a little bit of regular damge is the answer

edit also the specific mechanism i was think of using is simply cells have water in them manipulate some of that water to break the cell walls.

[Lord Il Palazzo]

You could have a whole line of such spells that cause different effects base by targetting cells in different parts of the body. Rupture Cells (Eyes) causes blindness, Rupture Cells (Arm) causes STR or DEX damage, Rupture Cells (Legs) reduces speed and so on. A few others could be heart or lungs for CON damage (or death) and stomach for sickened/nausea.

[Karoht]

Did anyone mention Dehydrate?
There is a Pathfinder Druid spell which does this. I want to say Dessicate but I'm pretty sure that isn't it.

[Kulture]

There are a number of suitable spells.

First is Rapture of Rupture from the Book of Vile Darkness, a 7th level corruption spell, touch, effects one target per level, effect as follows:

"When the caster touches a subject,
his flesh bursts open suddenly in
multiple places. Each subject takes
6d6 points of damage and is stunned
for 1 round; a successful Fortitude
save reduces damage by half and
negates the stun effect. Subjects who
fail their Fortitude save continue to
take 1d6 points of damage per round
until they receive magical healing,
succeed at a Heal check (DC 20), or
die. If a subject takes 6 points of
damage from rapture of rupture in a
single round, he is stunned in the following
round.
Corruption Cost: 1 point of Strength
damage per target touched."

Secondly is the spell avasculate and it's cousin Avascular mass, which explunges all of the liquid viscera from the body.
These are 7th and 8th level respectively and halve the health of those effected, with the latter also creating a large net of viscera that entangles those around it. These are found in Libris Mortis.

I'll post more examples as I find them.

[Tantaburs]

Extract Water Elemental is a really fun one, from spell Compendium. It does about the opposite of what the OP describes, though. It rips water from the target's body and animates it as as an elemental.

Slightly off topic but would Extract Water Elemental work on a Warforged. It says target: One living creature, Would Warforged count as a living creature as they are living constructs?

[Dayaz]

Slightly off topic but would Extract Water Elemental work on a Warforged. It says target: One living creature, Would Warforged count as a living creature as they are living constructs?

hrm... If it doesn't effect constructs then no it wouldn't

If it doesn't say, then yes it does (I proclaim it an Oil Elemental. I will name it Blacky and it shall be my Blacky)

[DementedFellow]

Why not just use desiccation damage out of Sandstorm?

[Slipperychicken]

hrm... If it doesn't effect constructs then no it wouldn't

If it doesn't say, then yes it does (I proclaim it an Oil Elemental. I will name it Blacky and it shall be my Blacky)

AFAIK, Warforged don't need oil.

[Andorax]

As with many things in D&D, too much detail about what's going on is a bad thing. Let's be honest...most of the stuff a wizard can do ought to be fatal, "levels" be darned. Much like most firearms at point blank range would be.


I've generally found that if you keep your science at the medieval/renisance level, and have your spells reference that level of technology, you're safer and you stay more in-character and in-setting. Manipulate the water in the body (as one of the four elements), but let's not start the debate about damaging cells.

[awa]

First desiccation damage is also something they can do it causes fatigue
I wanted a third basic attack type for water mages
Second the people casting the spell don’t know what a cell is they just move the water in the targets body around violently in a localized location