3.5 What's better than Create Water?

[unseenmage]

For my purposes the spells would be at CL5.

I'm looking for an up to 2nd level spell that creates water that I can use most effectively with the Water to Acid spell from Stormwrack.

Best I've been able to find is an Empowered (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/feats.htm#empowerSpell) Create Water (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/createWater.htm) which only nets me 15 gallons. (My mistake, Empower doesn't work here, thanks Xervous, and Thiyr.)
Best I've been able to find is Create Water (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/createWater.htm).
As Water to Acid can make a little over 37 gallons of water into acid that seems like a waste.

Also, how many Flasks of Acid can one get from a single casting of Water to Acid at CL5?
The spell Anarchic Water from Spell Compendium is precedent for 1 flask equaling 1 pint.

Edit: This exercise assumes that water is not a "free" resource.

[Srasy]

Why wouldn't filling an enveloping pit work?

[unseenmage]

Why wouldn't filling an enveloping pit work?

I'm not sure what you mean.

Where the water gets created isn't the problem. Making sure that there's water available via Create Water or a substitute is the idea.

The exercise assumes water to not be a "free" resource. Will edit the OP to reflect this. Apologies for any misunderstanding.

[Baroknik]

The enveloping pit is referencing a magic item that's basically a giant portable hole of you could fill with water.
Or for 9000 gold pieces you could purchase buy decanter of endless water and make up to 30 gallons per turn

[Xervous]

As create water has no variable numeric components (i.e. dice rolls) it is ineligible for the empower spell metamagic feat.

[ericgrau]

Gate to the plane of water. Assuming a 20 foot hoop and pressure equal to 10 feet of depth, that's 60,000 gallons per second for up to 120 seconds, or 7.2 million gallons. Also fills a 70'x70' room in one round.

[Spuddles]

Do you have downtime? Access to a large source of water? Use shrink item! Store it as cloth patches so it doesnt get your pockets wet.

[Thiyr]

Two things.

First, When linking for empower, you probably wanted This (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/feats.htm#empowerSpell), which links directly to the feat rather than the feat index.

Second, empower actually won't be helping you out there barring DM niceness. Empower only modifies variable numbers (that is to say, dice-based numbers, things that are randomized. The SRD is less clear about it, but the PHB is more direct about it.)


As far as helping you with your question...I doubt there's gonna be any spell that outright does what you're looking for. Doing a brief search for spells with the water subtype at those levels came up with a whole lotta nothing. Your best bet is probably gonna be storing large quantities of water produced via create water, or picking up a decanter of endless water eventually. Maybe melting ice, but that's gonna have its own problems.

[Ruethgar]

Powdered water is a thing, holds 16 ounces in one ounce as I recall and would be much easier to carry.

As to the empowering of create water, the amount of water created is up to 2gal per level, quite clearly a variable effect. And it is next to impossible to have anything without random variables, making that sentence in the PHB moot.

However, repeat spell is better for more creation. Also look up the War spell template which will give you 50gal per caster level, throw on sanctum spell(outside the sanctum) and you can ignore the 50g cost without involving the DM in determining the price of water(of course by applying sanctum to create water you have just given water a negative price). Still uses a first level slot even if it is a 0 level spell.

[TuggyNE]

As to the empowering of create water, the amount of water created is up to 2gal per level, quite clearly a variable effect. And it is next to impossible to have anything without random variables, making that sentence in the PHB moot.

A reading that makes a restricting statement irrelevant is usually a poor reading, since restrictions are generally written to be meaningful. A much more sensible reading, then, would be to accept that "variable" and "random variable" are synonymous; "up to 2 gal per level" is not random, because it is not decided by dice.

In any case, of course, create water does not in fact have any random variables at all, so the point is moot and the premise suspect.

[Eurus]

Cloudburst creates quite a bit of water, but it evaporates over the course of about ten minutes after the spell ends. That's not as bad as it sounds, since the spell itself lasts 10 minutes per level, but it's not a really long term thing.

The spells Rushing Waters and Tidal Surge create big waves of water, and doesn't say that the water goes away after. In fact, since they're instantaneous conjurations, it seems likely that they'd be permanent. So that's a decent way to fill a really big container or get a whole bunch of people soaking wet, but it doesn't say exactly how much you get.

[Ruethgar]

Wherever there are humans involved there are random variables. Unless it is a perfect computer playing D&D, there will be a chance for something other than what the spell intended to occur. A DM may be using one of the many magic disruption rules, the player may suffer from arcane spell failure, the gods may just say no to the spell, there could be a DM fiat. Then there is also physics to kill all the catgirls with its random variables. Even assuming a 100% stable location where quantum physics backs off, the water itself has a great number of states it could arrive in within the confines of the spell with just pressure, temperature, and state of matter(ice can flow without melting and thus is not rigid as a solid is supposed to be knocking it back to being a liquid and eligible for create water).

Also, the first use of variable in the feat is an adjective describing the effect which can change to be anywhere from one molecule to 2gal per level. The second use of variable is a noun meaning a factor that is liable to vary or change with the added adjective of random meaning the factors may be of an array of choices. They are not synonymous terms.

[Maginomicon]

Powdered water is a thing, holds 16 ounces in one ounce as I recall and would be much easier to carry.Not 16 ounces, 1 GALLON.

Psionic Minor Creation: Powdered Water

Creating 1 cu. ft/level (powdered water is arguably plant-based, as succulent plants are a thing) means you can create 957+ ounces of powdered water PER LEVEL. That translates to 957+ gallons of water (just dump an ounce of real water from a vial to start a massive chain reaction). Granted it's temporary, but 957+ gallons per level is still a LOT of water. Even if you have to take Psionic Minor Creation through the Hidden Talent feat, that's a lot of water.

[TuggyNE]

Wherever there are humans involved there are random variables. Unless it is a perfect computer playing D&D, there will be a chance for something other than what the spell intended to occur. A DM may be using one of the many magic disruption rules, the player may suffer from arcane spell failure, the gods may just say no to the spell, there could be a DM fiat. Then there is also physics to kill all the catgirls with its random variables. Even assuming a 100% stable location where quantum physics backs off, the water itself has a great number of states it could arrive in within the confines of the spell with just pressure, temperature, and state of matter(ice can flow without melting and thus is not rigid as a solid is supposed to be knocking it back to being a liquid and eligible for create water).

Wat.

None of those are part of the spell! So none of those count at all, any more than "an enemy might take an AoO that might hit based on a die roll" or "someone is making an unrelated attack roll elsewhere" would count. Some of them are not even random in the D&D sense, being irrelevant to the scale involved, or not random at all, or just non-numeric. (Deific fiat is not even slightly random, and neither is DM fiat; the state of ice/water/steam, even if you take the highly dubious position that you can pick all of those because ???, is not numeric, and neither is ASF or non-homebrewed magic disruption. And if you're talking about the hypothetical possibility of miscellaneous unspecified homebrew, well, sorry, that's just not even in scope at all.)


Also, the first use of variable in the feat is an adjective describing the effect which can change to be anywhere from one molecule to 2gal per level. The second use of variable is a noun meaning a factor that is liable to vary or change with the added adjective of random meaning the factors may be of an array of choices. They are not synonymous terms.


All variable, numeric effects of an empowered spell are increased by one-half.

Saving throws and opposed rolls are not affected, nor are spells without random variables.

So we have two usages of "variable": one is "variable, numeric" and the other is "random variable". However, because of the structure (all X within a spell are modified; if no X, no modification), these are treated as synonymous by the feat text, which means that what it's really saying is "All random variable numeric effects of an empowered spell are increased by one-half.

Saving throws and opposed rolls are not affected, nor are spells without random variable numeric effects."

Not sure why you're trying to argue that adjectives and nouns cannot refer to the same concept, since a "variable" is a thing that can change, and a "variable" X is an X that can change.

[Ruethgar]

Steam is quite clearly a gas, ice is not as clearly a solid and can be defined as a liquid. There was a time after Mystara died where magic had a chance of failure, that was the magic disruption I had in mind. Arcane spell failure is a numeric variable thats effects are randomly determined per cast under certain conditions, if you can manage ASF on a normally divine spell more power to you.

A spell is the effect of casting(to be most precise: A one-time magical effect). If there are any random variables involved with the effect, then it cannot be considered to be without them even though the variables may not have originated from that which is being cast.

Adjectives and nouns can refer to the same concept, however it is never stated that the two phrases were referring to the same concept, you only inferred that they were which is not RAW.

[TuggyNE]

Arcane spell failure is a numeric variable thats effects are randomly determined per cast under certain conditions, if you can manage ASF on a normally divine spell more power to you.

It isn't. It's a percentage chance of a binary non-numeric outcome (either you cast the spell, or you don't; neither is numeric at all), much like teleport's percentage chance of several non-numeric outcomes (mishaps or off-targetting), or reincarnate's percentage chance of various non-numeric outcomes (races).


A spell is the effect of casting(to be most precise: A one-time magical effect). If there are any random variables involved with the effect, then it cannot be considered to be without them even though the variables may not have originated from that which is being cast.

This assumption seems unwarranted; the spell itself is defined, with its own mechanics in a tidy little listing. Effects that are not part of the spell itself are, well, not part of the spell itself, and as such cannot reasonably be included, any more than an AoO is part of moving past an enemy.


Adjectives and nouns can refer to the same concept, however it is never stated that the two phrases were referring to the same concept, you only inferred that they were which is not RAW.

Inferred from the structure of the text, yes. Or is reading the plain way a text is structured suddenly not a valid method of determining meaning?

Anyway, this doesn't seem to be going anywhere, so unless some new counter-argument develops, consider me silenced but entirely unconvinced.

[Ruethgar]

This assumption seems unwarranted; the spell itself is defined, with its own mechanics in a tidy little listing. Effects that are not part of the spell itself are, well, not part of the spell itself, and as such cannot reasonably be included, any more than an AoO is part of moving past an enemy.

Inferred from the structure of the text, yes. Or is reading the plain way a text is structured suddenly not a valid method of determining meaning?

Anyway, this doesn't seem to be going anywhere, so unless some new counter-argument develops, consider me silenced but entirely unconvinced.

The feat does not specify that the random variables must be a part of the spell, just that the spell must be without them. The definition of a spell by D&D is "A one-time magical effect." No other definition is valid. The one time magical effect does include and use external random variables in some situations for determining what occurs from casting. The very definition of without is to exclude and not use.

Inference is fine to determine meaning but falls more into the realm of RAI than RAW and is subject to greater opinion.

Indeed this seems to be futile especially it being the discussion of the least potent way to potentially increase water production.

Stick with psionic creation or sanctum war water, both are very nice. If you are a STP Erudite you can of course cut out the components and skip the war spell feat requisite to learn the power in addition to minor creation of powdered water.

[Spuddles]

Sandstorm has Flashflood. Level 9 spell that creates like 200,000 gallons of water. Build a big reservoir, buy a scroll, now water is a "free" resource.


Steam is quite clearly a gas, ice is not as clearly a solid and can be defined as a liquid. There was a time after Mystara died where magic had a chance of failure, that was the magic disruption I had in mind. Arcane spell failure is a numeric variable thats effects are randomly determined per cast under certain conditions, if you can manage ASF on a normally divine spell more power to you.

A spell is the effect of casting(to be most precise: A one-time magical effect). If there are any random variables involved with the effect, then it cannot be considered to be without them even though the variables may not have originated from that which is being cast.

Adjectives and nouns can refer to the same concept, however it is never stated that the two phrases were referring to the same concept, you only inferred that they were which is not RAW.

What the hell are you talking about.

[Ruethgar]

What the hell are you talking about.

Mostly the language behind the potential application of Empower to Create Water. I'ld need to brush up on my traps but if you can build in metamagic, create a Sanctum Spell Trap of Create Water, it is free to make(level -1 spells are great like that) so you can get as many as you want.

[Sith_Happens]

ice is not as clearly a solid and can be defined as a liquid.

...What? I don't know where you heard this, but it is completely wrong.

[Spuddles]

...What? I don't know where you heard this, but it is completely wrong.

It's not wrong- you can define ice as a liquid. You can define ice as lots of things. You could define ice as a plasma, or legos, or kittens. I think I'd like to define ice as a chain-link fence.

See what you can do with idiotic semantics? You're not wrong; just wasting everyone's time.

[Kuulvheysoon]

Not 16 ounces, 1 GALLON.

Psionic Minor Creation: Powdered Water

Creating 1 cu. ft/level (powdered water is arguably plant-based, as succulent plants are a thing) means you can create 957+ ounces of powdered water PER LEVEL. That translates to 957+ gallons of water (just dump an ounce of real water from a vial to start a massive chain reaction). Granted it's temporary, but 957+ gallons per level is still a LOT of water. Even if you have to take Psionic Minor Creation through the Hidden Talent feat, that's a lot of water.

Wait, psionic minor creation that's not being used to make Black Lotus Extract? Color me impressed.:smallcool:

[Ruethgar]

A solid requires that the form be a rigid structure that keeps its shape, ice can flow without being melted and fit the form of its container as is the definition of a liquid, though it does so very slowly. Generally other effects alter the ice before the flow becomes noticeable and so it is most often classified as a solid since it keeps most of its shape for a very long time(months before it was noticeable, a year and a half before it was half way spread out).

Ice can only be defined as kittens or a chain link fence if sculpted that way and only as legos if made/shaped/processed by that company. You would have to do a whole hell of a lot to ice to make it plasma and it probably will no longer be ice when you are done.

[Spuddles]

ice can flow

Via pressure mediated melting and stress deformation. That makes it no less a solid than a metal wire bending under its own weight.

[georgie_leech]

Most things settle over time. Under that definition, plastic, concrete, most metals, glass, etc. can all be classified as liquids. At that point, it ceases to be a useful descriptor.

EDIT: Ninja'd with the proper physical process to boot.

[Ruethgar]

Was fairly sure pitch is a liquid and that only took 70 years to drip. It took ice a bit less time. At what point do you draw the line between a settling solid and a viscus liquid?

[TroubleBrewing]

Was fairly sure pitch is a liquid and that only took 70 years to drip. It took ice a bit less time. At what point do you draw the line between a settling solid and a viscus liquid?

Is it relevant to the discussion? Doubtful.

Is it a method of generating water using the 3.5 ruleset? Even less certain.

Should we collectively agree to move on, or at least move this pedantic argument to another thread? Almost definitely.

[Spuddles]

Is it relevant to the discussion? Doubtful.

Is it a method of generating water using the 3.5 ruleset? Even less certain.

Should we collectively agree to move on, or at least move this pedantic argument to another thread? Almost definitely.

Seconded. Motion to pass?

[Kuulvheysoon]

Seconded. Motion to pass?

Consider it done.

IIRC, there should be a lowish level spell in Sandstorm that might suit your needs here.

[georgie_leech]

Agreed. For the record though, I call pitch Viscoelastic. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Viscoelastic)

[TroubleBrewing]

IIRC, there should be a lowish level spell in Sandstorm that might suit your needs here.

Wall of Water is 4t level, and makes a 1-foot thick, 10 square foot wall of water per level. So, 70 cubic feet of water, or 523 gallons per casting. At 7th level, that is.

On a side note, Flashflood (8th level spell) makes 100,000 cubic feet.

[AlexanderRM]

Sorry but could someone explain Powdered Water to me? Where is that from? The only things which come up on Google are a real-life substance called Dry Water (which while very cool as far as I can tell has approximately the same volume and mass as liquid water, higher if anything) and this thread, plus a bunch of things which include the words powder and water.

[TroubleBrewing]

Dust of Dryness.

[Maginomicon]

Sorry but could someone explain Powdered Water to me? Where is that from? The only things which come up on Google are a real-life substance called Dry Water (which while very cool as far as I can tell has approximately the same volume and mass as liquid water, higher if anything) and this thread, plus a bunch of things which include the words powder and water.



Powdered Water
5sp, 1 oz. not including the jug; Alchemy DC 10
This fine white powder sparkles faintly. An ounce, when mixed with a drop of water, becomes a gallon of drinkable water. The powder is usually put in a vessel that can contain the full gallon of water before the drop of activating liquid is added. The vessel is then shaken to agitate the mixture. It takes a full round for the gallon of water to form. The powder must be kept in a water-tight container to remain effective, but it is an easy way to transport large amounts of water over great distances.

When made wet by even a drop of water turns it into a whole gallon within 1 round. A cascade effect would naturally result when large quantities of powdered water are used.

[unseenmage]

When made wet by even a drop of water turns it into a whole gallon within 1 round. A cascade effect would naturally result when large quantities of powdered water are used.

I wonder how fast a decent alchemist can mass manufacture this stuff. Would be cool to Animate Objects a large volume of this stuff and Minor Servitor (SS) a comparable volume of water and have them team up to flood dungeon passageways in emergencies.

Maybe coat the Powdered Water creature in some other watertight substance to keep it from mixing when you don't want it to. Or a Called armor that is watertight?

[Dalebert]

Ew! New spell idea!

Wall of Powdered Water

Lawd...

[Incanur]

Just by casting create water four times and water to acid once, you've got access to enough acid to fill 310+ flasks assuming a full 1lb per flask. However, the flask obviously weighs something too; RAW the flask weighs more empty than full, but that makes no sense. Anyway, even under this conservative reading, you can make 1,500gp selling acid flasks at half price per each time you cast water to acid with the full amount of water available. :smallannoyed:

[Blackhawk748]

or you can have a spiffy acid moat

[Dalebert]

There should be a dehydrate spell that can create powdered water. Thoughts? I'm going to cook something up in the homebrew section. Come give your feedback if you're interested. I know there's a dehydrate spell already but it's fairly obscure so I'm stealing the name. :)

[ericgrau]

There's dust of dryness (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/magicItems/wondrousItems.htm#dustofDryness) which stores 100 gallons and damages water elementals. Based on its cost it could be a 3rd level spell with an ad hoc +4 to the save DC against elementals.

[unseenmage]

There should be a dehydrate spell that can create powdered water. Thoughts? I'm going to cook something up in the homebrew section. Come give your feedback if you're interested. I know there's a dehydrate spell already but it's fairly obscure so I'm stealing the name. :)

In the 3.0 PH in the text for Polymorph Any Object there is reference to a spell that didn't actually make it into the book called Transmute Water to Dust.

Could call your spell Transmute Water to Powdered Water. I find that, with homebrew, names which convey utility are often more useful than names which sound cool. But that's just my observation though. :smallsmile:

[Dalebert]

Could call your spell Transmute Water to Powdered Water. I find that, with homebrew, names which convey utility are often more useful than names which sound cool. But that's just my observation though. :smallsmile:

Jynx! I went with Water to Powder (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=16530343#post16530343) before I saw your post because I looked up Sunstroke and realized that was necromancy when this should be transmutation.

[Orran]

Obscuring mist creates a 10ft square of mist, no idea how much water that is, but could Water to Acid change it? If so could be quite a nice low level combination.

[Ruethgar]

I calculated the amount of fog create water could make if you could designate state of matter freely in conjurations. It was something to the effect of 100ft cubed for very thick fog. A 10ft square would be impossible to exist, if it were a 10ft cube it still wouldn't be much water but it is a two spell combo Acid Fog at a much lower level.

[AlexanderRM]

By RAW, it sounds like you can only affect liquid water with Water to Acid, and even if you could affect fog it would be based on volume. Sad, that's a cool idea.

Plus, I'm not sure if you could technically do that with spell effects anyway- all the fog spells have durations based on caster level, meaning they're magical effects, not just regular fog, even if they otherwise act exactly like regular fog, so... stuff gets weird. I suppose that if a spell could turn fog into acid it ought to be able to turn Obscuring Mist into acid, with Solid Fog or the like it would get more questionable.

[Sith_Happens]

I calculated the amount of fog create water could make if you could designate state of matter freely in conjurations. It was something to the effect of 100ft cubed for very thick fog. A 10ft square would be impossible to exist, if it were a 10ft cube it still wouldn't be much water but it is a two spell combo Acid Fog at a much lower level.

Even if you could choose which phase of water you're creating, the spell would still make 2 gallons/level of whichever one you picked.

[Yuki Akuma]

It amuses me that trying to cheese create water by making steam or mist (or, for that matter, ice) instead of actual water would result in creating less water anyway.