How can I refill a dry lake quickly?

[Someonelse]

So here's the situation...
BBEG's evil temple is in the middle of the largest desert in the campaign world at the bottom of a dry lake bed. As a point of reference the DM said that the lake is about the size of lake michigan with a maximum depth of 900ft. The evil temple is situated in one of the deepest parts of the dry lake bed.
The DM pretty much put it there as a red herring, since it's unlikely that we could produce enough water to fill the lake or even cause a flash flood. We have a decanter of endless water, but I calculated it would take more decanters of endless water than probably exist in the entire campaign world to refill the lake in any reasonable amount of time, and a single decanter on the highest setting would take something like 3 million years to do the job. We considered a portal to the elemental plane of water and came to a similar conclusion. I looked it up and there are something like one quadrillion gallons of water in lake michigan, not counting all the rivers that flow to and from the lake.
Long ago this lake was supplied by melt water from a distant mountain range. Due to campaign specific reasons I won't go into here this entire continent hasn't seen a single drop of water in a very long time.
The group has access to wish and miracle, but I don't think even those spells could suddenly summon a quadrillion gallons of water.
So what do you think?
Is there any way our party could flood out the evil temple?
Or should we bust in the doors with swords-a-swinging and spells-a-blazing as usual?

[Gildedragon]

Fill it with what?
Chickens? That is quick... Very quick

Not chickens?
Flash flood is a spell in sandscape, tsunami another from Stormwrack iirc
What level are you? Also you don't need to fill the lake, just the temple. just make it the locally deepest part with walls etc

[John Longarrow]

Someonelse

If its the size of Lake Michigan, you would be better off going into orbit and dropping a very large weight on it. You would need a couple hundred square miles of water to do more than just get their feet wet.

[gomipile]

So here's the situation...
BBEG's evil temple is in the middle of the largest desert in the campaign world at the bottom of a dry lake bed. As a point of reference the DM said that the lake is about the size of lake michigan with a maximum depth of 900ft. The evil temple is situated in one of the deepest parts of the dry lake bed.
The DM pretty much put it there as a red herring, since it's unlikely that we could produce enough water to fill the lake or even cause a flash flood. We have a decanter of endless water, but I calculated it would take more decanters of endless water than probably exist in the entire campaign world to refill the lake in any reasonable amount of time, and a single decanter on the highest setting would take something like 3 million years to do the job. We considered a portal to the elemental plane of water and came to a similar conclusion. I looked it up and there are something like one quadrillion gallons of water in lake michigan, not counting all the rivers that flow to and from the lake.
Long ago this lake was supplied by melt water from a distant mountain range. Due to campaign specific reasons I won't go into here this entire continent hasn't seen a single drop of water in a very long time.
The group has access to wish and miracle, but I don't think even those spells could suddenly summon a quadrillion gallons of water.
So what do you think?
Is there any way our party could flood out the evil temple?
Or should we bust in the doors with swords-a-swinging and spells-a-blazing as usual?

You could use Genesis to create a fast-time demiplane filled with water under high pressure, then open a Gate to it. Unfortunately, while this could produce the requisite amount of water in a short time, the water would arrive at a ridiculously high speed. If you used a 20 foot diameter gate, and produced water at the required rate to fill the lake in 24 hours, It would arrive at about 1950 kilometers per second, or 0.65% of the speed of light.

That much effort and energy could surely be directed in a more productive manner. Besides, a proper CR 20+ BBEG would surely find the submersion of a fortress to be an inconvenience at most.

[Dunditschia]

If you have the time and its not too far removed from an ocean or large sea, you could make a channel to the lake, letting it be filled by the ocean. You could use move earth (a 6th level druid/sorceror/wizard spell) to create it, or undermaster (9th level) if you want to do it faster.

Once you have a shallow channel, the flow of water will enlarge it, as long as the temple itself is below sea level.

[Seerow]

You could use Genesis to create a fast-time demiplane filled with water under high pressure, then open a Gate to it. Unfortunately, while this could produce the requisite amount of water in a short time, the water would arrive at a ridiculously high speed. If you used a 20 foot diameter gate, and produced water at the required rate to fill the lake in 24 hours, It would arrive at about 1950 kilometers per second, or 0.65% of the speed of light.

That much effort and energy could surely be directed in a more productive manner. Besides, a proper CR 20+ BBEG would surely find the submersion of a fortress to be an inconvenience at most.

A sunken fortress may be an inconvenience, but being smacked with a beam of relativistic speed water will probably be sufficient to destroy his fortress and him with it. And who would expect it?

[Darrin]

1. Ask the DM, "Well, it sounds like this temple is at one of the deepest parts of the dry lakebed, and so the rest of the lakebed gradually slopes upward as you move away from the temple... what's the grade of that slope? About two percent?"

2. If the DM says, "Yeah, two percent sounds about right", then dig a small 1' deep hole outside the temple. Fill it with water. Walk 550' away.

3. Using wish/miracle, cast control water + Repeat Spell (equivalent of a 7th level cleric spell). Assuming a caster level of 20, this creates 3,200,000 cubic feet of water. It also fills a cone with a 500' radius and 12' height (2% slope). So that should at least put the first floor under water.

[Techwarrior]

A sunken fortress may be an inconvenience, but being smacked with a beam of relativistic speed water will probably be sufficient to destroy his fortress and him with it. And who would expect it?

This reminds me of a signature I read somewhere that went along of the lines of 'and if the party wizard can't survive being crushed by a faster than light falling iron dragon at epic levels it's his own fault really.'

[Coidzor]

Do you have a high level druid handy? Fimbulwinter, Blizzard, Flash Flood, and making a whole bunch of appropriate Elemental Weird (Snow?, Ice, Water) Ice Assassins should get you a bunch of creatures to spend their time casting the necessary spells throughout the entire area that would drain to that lake. Also over the lake. And the fortress.

[Phelix-Mu]

A sunken fortress may be an inconvenience, but being smacked with a beam of relativistic speed water will probably be sufficient to destroy his fortress and him with it. And who would expect it?

Speaking of the gate concept, is there anything in the spell to suggest that passive qualities of materials and planes can pass through the gate? I've thought of several uses that could make use of that if it worked, but it always seemed to me that the only things that can move through the gate are attended items or creatures, and possibly things actively thrown through the gate.

If gate allowed things like osmosis and pressure, void, elemental energies, and so forth to cross the portal, than the whole world could ended by just gating to a part of the Negative Energy Plane with no air, or by compound-gating the surface of the sun into the atmosphere (causing it to boil away, assuming the in-game sun works in a way similar to the real sun), which doesn't seem well-supported by the function of the spell (transport).

Anyway, I just thought I'd toss that out there. The spell, if possible, becomes even more abusable than I thought if this all works.

[Vedhin]

Speaking of the gate concept, is there anything in the spell to suggest that passive qualities of materials and planes can pass through the gate? I've thought of several uses that could make use of that if it worked, but it always seemed to me that the only things that can move through the gate are attended items or creatures, and possibly things actively thrown through the gate.

If gate allowed things like osmosis and pressure, void, elemental energies, and so forth to cross the portal, than the whole world could ended by just gating to a part of the Negative Energy Plane with no air, or by compound-gating the surface of the sun into the atmosphere (causing it to boil away, assuming the in-game sun works in a way similar to the real sun), which doesn't seem well-supported by the function of the spell (transport).

Anyway, I just thought I'd toss that out there. The spell, if possible, becomes even more abusable than I thought if this all works.

Bah, that's what Planar Ring Gates are for.

Also, the Arms & Equipment Guide has the Eversoaking Sponge. Just get some of those, find an actual body of water, and throw them at the Evil Lair.

[gomipile]

Speaking of the gate concept, is there anything in the spell to suggest that passive qualities of materials and planes can pass through the gate? I've thought of several uses that could make use of that if it worked, but it always seemed to me that the only things that can move through the gate are attended items or creatures, and possibly things actively thrown through the gate.

If gate allowed things like osmosis and pressure, void, elemental energies, and so forth to cross the portal, than the whole world could ended by just gating to a part of the Negative Energy Plane with no air, or by compound-gating the surface of the sun into the atmosphere (causing it to boil away, assuming the in-game sun works in a way similar to the real sun), which doesn't seem well-supported by the function of the spell (transport).

Anyway, I just thought I'd toss that out there. The spell, if possible, becomes even more abusable than I thought if this all works.

Not really, because as written, there is no way I am aware of to make a permanent Gate. The scenario I posited requires some DM fiat to keep a gate open for 24 hours. Gate as written lasts for up to 1 round/level of concentration.

[Jack_Simth]

Not really, because as written, there is no way I am aware of to make a permanent Gate. The scenario I posited requires some DM fiat to keep a gate open for 24 hours. Gate as written lasts for up to 1 round/level of concentration.
Find a native of a plane that's timeless with respect to magic. Cast Planar Bubble on it. Now spells within a short radius of that creature do not expire. Open Gate within said radius. It'll now last as long as you care to concentrate on it.

[unseenmage]

When I faced a large body of water that I needed to move quickly I used War Magic spells (see my sig) combined with summons (War Magic nets you 25 per CL) and Excavate (Un) which is basically Passwall only permanent.

For your purposes you would need to find a body of water of appropriate depth and then just tunnel from one point to the other using enough summons and enough Excavates to move enough water to get the job done.

Metamagic-ing the Excavates could help too. Just remember that making them War Magic spells ups their spell level by one.

[weckar]

As Darrin basically pointed out, you're looking at the problem wrong. If the temple sits at the bottom of the lake, there is no need to fill the whole lake. Just the bottom of it. That is a lot less water you're dealing with.

For a related example, consider the Water Temple in the legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time. Even though the lake isn't full at the time, the temple itself is still deep enough underwater that it cannot easily be reached.

[Sir Chuckles]

A sunken fortress may be an inconvenience, but being smacked with a beam of relativistic speed water will probably be sufficient to destroy his fortress and him with it. And who would expect it?

Genesis Rail Water Gun Hydro-Pump?

[weckar]

Thinking about it, you wouldn't technically have to fill it with WATER at all, now would you? If you're going to go this far, might as well fill it with something far more harmful... like sand.

[Sir Chuckles]

Thinking about it, you wouldn't technically have to fill it with WATER at all, now would you? If you're going to go this far, might as well fill it with something far more harmful... like sand.

I vote for molten lead.
Blocks many spells much more quickly, suffocates, and would probably be called to do heat damage.

[weckar]

Well, so much for the sandshaper mantra. Molten lead is nasty stuff. Scars like a ****

[unseenmage]

Thinking about it, you wouldn't technically have to fill it with WATER at all, now would you? If you're going to go this far, might as well fill it with something far more harmful... like sand.

There's a thread about dust linked in my sig. It has info on sand too.
You don't have to use just ordinary sand, why not use Awakened Sand, or Black Sand (evil temple so that's probably a bad idea but still), or any number of various powders and granules. Everything from irritating chili powder to flammable Smoke Powder could be fun.

For volume nothing beats combining True Creation with piles and piles of Spellclocks in my book. :smallbiggrin:

Edit: But yeah, molten lead sounds like a way better idea.

[gomipile]

Why stop at lead? Molten tungsten would be far more damaging, less toxic to bystanders, and much harder to excavate out of once hardened, if anything survives it.

For that matter, since this is D&D, why not molten adamantine? Either would be just as easy as the water example above, and burying just the target fortress wouldn't require relativistic pressures or more time than one normal casting of Gate.

[Eldan]

These metals have various advantages, yes. However, lead has the advantage that it explicitly stops several kinds of magic.

[Erik Vale]

Lead Adamantium Mixture?
... I'm now imagining the creation of a plane/s of molten metal under super high pressure being used for gating to to make thanix cannons.

[weckar]

Actually, the greater density of molten metal will result in higher pressures, therefore greater flow speed at similar viscosity through a horizontal portal.

[John Longarrow]

Lead?
Powedered Magnesium/Aluminum.

From a safe place (preferably a different plane) summon a fire elemental in the middle.

[Sir Chuckles]

Actually, the greater density of molten metal will result in higher pressures, therefore greater flow speed at similar viscosity through a horizontal portal.

Aim it carefully, shrink the portal to make it wide enough to flood, but small enough to deal damage in concentrated areas. Remove your need to breath. Make yourself immune to heat damage. Word of Recall. Use Ring Gates to aim it.

[weckar]

All this of course assuming that the temple isn't the very REASON the lake is dry, in which case drain speed may be faster than entry speed.
And the DM may have planned a daring escape against the re-flooding once you take out the evil inside.
[totes stealing it]

[ChocoSuisse]

I'd say Miracle is exactly the kind of spell for this.

Alternatively, a cleric can make a very powerful request. Casting such a miracle costs the cleric 5,000 XP because of the powerful divine energies involved. Examples of especially powerful miracles of this sort could include the following.

Swinging the tide of a battle in your favor by raising fallen allies to continue fighting.
Moving you and your allies, with all your and their gear, from one plane to another through planar barriers to a specific locale with no chance of error.
Protecting a city from an earthquake, volcanic eruption, flood, or other major natural disaster. => Close enough

But I don't know your DM's style.
There's a good chance he says "that doesn't work because (insert reasons)", because he wants you to enter the temple he spent hours designing.

[Vedhin]

There's a thread about dust linked in my sig. It has info on sand too.
You don't have to use just ordinary sand, why not use Awakened Sand, or Black Sand (evil temple so that's probably a bad idea but still), or any number of various powders and granules. Everything from irritating chili powder to flammable Smoke Powder could be fun.

For volume nothing beats combining True Creation with piles and piles of Spellclocks in my book. :smallbiggrin:

Edit: But yeah, molten lead sounds like a way better idea.

Your thread lacks the Decanter of Endless Sand (or something along those lines) in Sandstorm.

[unseenmage]

Your thread lacks the Decanter of Endless Sand (or something along those lines) in Sandstorm.

Ooh thank you, will find and add.

[Coidzor]

Lead?
Powedered Magnesium/Aluminum.

From a safe place (preferably a different plane) summon a fire elemental in the middle.

A non-ferrous alternative to thermite, you say?

[gomipile]

A non-ferrous alternative to thermite, you say?

Thermite is a self contained fuel, while magnesium and aluminum require atmospheric oxygen(or another high electronegativity gas, like fluorine, chlorine, various oxidizers, etc.) to burn. Thermite wouldn't work with my Genesis+Gate cannon, though. Aluminum and magnesium have the advantage of being thermobaric weapons in this case. They would deplete the target area of oxygen nearly completely, most likely. The thermobaric effect wouldn't do any good against undead in and of itself, but fire hot enough to destroy buildings should ensure that the attack isn't a waste.

Combine all of this with Endure Elements, flight of some sort, and a bottle of air, and you could aim the cannon from a great height. You might want to have a contingent teleport ready in case any of this is energetic enough to be lethal to the caster within one round of casting the Gate.

[John Longarrow]

Plus if the target is deep enough you get the sudden MASSIVE influx of air after the fire starts. Firestorm time and wait for the temple to melt.

IIRC, properly oxygenated you should get that fuel mix hot enough to turn stone buildings into glowing puddles...

[Curmudgeon]

If your mission is flooding the lair, you don't worry about anything except the area of the lakebed and the slope. Control Weather will do the rest. A Druid with Control Weather making torrential rain is more than enough to cause a flash flood at the bottom.

[Gildedragon]

Wouldn't the explosive thermite solution cause... You know... Loot damage? Sure you get XP but what about the treasure? Won't you please think of the treasure!
-ahem-
Also you don't need to flood-kill the fellers inside. Make it so the entrance is a squeeze to get through and just start trickling water in, someone comes to investigate: kill or capture. Repeat as needed or until temple has flooded

Or make the entrance too tight to squeeze past and flood at your leisure

[toapat]

2 castings of Shaped Maximized FImbulwinter will completely fill the lakebed if you are in winter

It will take 2 days per floor to encase though.

[Jormengand]

I vote for molten lead.
Blocks many spells much more quickly, suffocates, and would probably be called to do heat damage.

Stop aggressing our structure, you eccentric witch!

[John Longarrow]

Odd question to OP...
Do you know WHAT is protecting the temple? Sounds like with enough castings of Cloud Kill you could clear the place out without too much problem...

[toapat]

2 castings of Shaped Maximized FImbulwinter will completely fill the lakebed if you are in winter

It will take 2 days per floor to encase though.

correction: 9-11 castings of Shaped Maximized Fimbulwinter

[gomipile]

If your mission is flooding the lair, you don't worry about anything except the area of the lakebed and the slope. Control Weather will do the rest. A Druid with Control Weather making torrential rain is more than enough to cause a flash flood at the bottom.

Approximation based on the bathymetry of lake Michigan and assuming 2 inches per hour from torrential rains gives a water depth of about 17 feet at the center of the basin after one average Druid casting of Control Weather, not counting mud.

Source: http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/mgg/greatlakes/lakemich_cdrom/html/area4.htm

[Someonelse]

Thanks everyone for responding and debating! It really helps


I'd say Miracle is exactly the kind of spell for this.


But I don't know your DM's style.
There's a good chance he says "that doesn't work because (insert reasons)", because he wants you to enter the temple he spent hours designing.

We already tried that. The ruling was that Miracle can put a whole lot of water into the entire system, from the snow on the tops of the mountains, down the rivers to the lake; but at the location of the temple it would be, maybe an foot of water, and it would take about 10d4 years for it to refill the entire lake to the point where the water could flow down a river into the ocean (because the only source for the water is snow melt from the mountains).


Approximation based on the bathymetry of lake Michigan and assuming 2 inches per hour from torrential rains gives a water depth of about 17 feet at the center of the basin after one average Druid casting of Control Weather, not counting mud.

Source: http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/mgg/greatlakes/lakemich_cdrom/html/area4.htm

That is a good idea. I don't know why, but we only considered control weather over the mountains, so the water would collect up there and run down little streams that eventually merge into a big river that eventually feeds into this lake. We were going to use a Miracle to make it permanent so it would just rain until the lake was refilled, but we decided against it because we didn't want to cause so much erosion damage to the mountains. But we could do it right over the temple, it's supposed to be the bottom of the lake so erosion shouldn't really be a problem.


As Darrin basically pointed out, you're looking at the problem wrong. If the temple sits at the bottom of the lake, there is no need to fill the whole lake. Just the bottom of it. That is a lot less water you're dealing with.


Odd question to OP...
Do you know WHAT is protecting the temple? Sounds like with enough castings of Cloud Kill you could clear the place out without too much problem...

The temple is 300ft high and the entrance is on the top. So that means we only need to fill the lake up a little more than a third full to sink the temple. This isn't really going to do anything to stop the BBEG, but he has a LOT of minions and he is out gathering more and they are building a little camp / town around the base of this tower / temple.

Let me explain. This adventure is inspired by Demon God's Fane by Monte Cook, but the DM said he changed so much of it that it's not really even the same module, just the idea of the 300ft statue of a demon lord with the demon lord's temple inside. The temple belongs to a demon lord with divine rank (brought to the material plane along with his entire army by events from the last big adventure, which is a very long convoluted story). BBEG is away from his temple gathering his forces, which were scattered all over the world; and doing as much damage to the good people of the world and slaying angels (the demons and celestials came in equal numbers). BBEG is currently out and we don't expect him back for a while. He is still too tough for us to beat, but we're pretty sure we can take out the guys he keeps in this temple. The temple is the demon lord's main fortress, it's a statue of himself made of solid fiendish black adamantine (I don't remember where my group picked that up but it seems to come up a lot, it's a useful material. black adamantine is just like regular adamantine except it is immune to magic as if it were in an antimagic field) this particular metric s**t ton of black adamantine was mined in hell and has an evil taint (we're all a bunch of goody goodies so that's how the DM gets away with using magic and/or extremely expensive stuff with impunity without fear of it falling into PC hands). The mouth of the 300ft statue is open, and unless you are actually looking for a portal, you have no way of noticing when you enter the mouth that you are stepping into a demiplane until it's too late, on the contingency that a non Tanar'ri enters, the mouth snaps shut (no trap to find, it was a condition of the portal). Now we're trapped inside until we find a way out. The entire inner structure (walls, floors, ceilings and doors) is also made of black adamantine and enchanted with a dimensional lock that excludes Tanar'ri (being that BBEG has divine rank his dimensional lock spell works in an antimagic field, and on black adamantine), we did manage to figure out that if we polymorph into a Tanar'ri and make a DC30 UMD we can teleport and should in theory be able to plane shift out if we need to.

[Gildedragon]

we did manage to figure out that if we polymorph into a Tanar'ri and make a DC30 UMD we can teleport and should in theory be able to plane shift out if we need to.

You needn't PM into tanar'ri. UMD 25 to emulate a race, let's say Pitfiend.

[sleepyphoenixx]

Since the entrance is at the top is there any reason to flood the lake at all? Block any windows or other openings with Wall of Stone or similar means, then flood the temple directly.
Anything that comes out to escape drowning should be easy enough to ambush.

[The Grue]

Hm. One bag of Dust of Dryness weighs 1 lb, and can absorb 100 gallons of water.

100 gallons weighs between 830 and 840 lbs depending on the temperature. Ergo, Dust of Dryness can be conservatively said to absorb 830 times its weight in water.

The volume of Lake Michigan is estimated at 1.3(10^15) gallons, or 1,300,000,000,000,000 gallons. Thus, through simple division, we can see that one would need 1.6(10^12) lbs of Dust of Dryness to flood the valley detailed in the OP.

Coincidentally, the GP cost of Dust of Dryness (850) is very close to a single bag's water absorption capacity in gallons (830-840). In other words, you would need one GP for every gallon you wished to transport using it. So, while an interesting thought experiment, it seems this method is impractical for a number of reasons.

[Gildedragon]

Not nearly as quick but it would be useful (to halt the progress of BBEG) to fill it up with invisible spell quintessence

[Ruethgar]

Have a Cleric cast Persist War Flash Flood. That is 5.76 trillion gallons of water in one casting over the course of one day. If you get it cast as a Circle Spell, 11.52 trillion gallons.

Wizard casting Circle War Fimbulwinter Maximize and Widen. Assuming all variable numeric effects are maximized and not just the ones you roll for, also using a snow water density of about 12.5%(for ease of calculations), you get 17.83 trillion gallons over 48 days.

A Chiang Lung dragon, using shenanigans, can get it to rain for 36hr with a minimum of 25.84 trillion gallons over a 600 mile radius. Per breath every 1d4+10 or so rounds. A half Chiang Lung can do it too, and can even do it better by also being a DMM Cleric and adding 5.76 trillion, but it would have no feats left and be hard leveling up without much customization.

Also you can do a lot with Wish. Like Wish for a Rune Circle of Three Wishes. Or wish for a Circle Persist Twin Repeat Sanctum War Maximize Widen Fimbulwinter for 53.5 trillion gallons with the above assumptions. Do note that the only two metamagic feats that modify spell level are Sanctum and Heighten. So a Twin, Repeat, Persist, Ocular, Ray Extension, Extend, Ray Burst, Widen Create Water is only a level 0 spell, but it takes a 23rd level spell slot. The thing is wish only cares about the level, not the slot.

[Someonelse]

Since the entrance is at the top is there any reason to flood the lake at all? Block any windows or other openings with Wall of Stone or similar means, then flood the temple directly.
Anything that comes out to escape drowning should be easy enough to ambush.

The main reason we want to flood it out is so this abyssal army cannot use this temple as a rallying point. We are also a bunch of environmentalist tree hugger types and we want to heal this land, which begins by bringing water to the desert and refilling this lake.

I'll explain the situation, it's kinda wordy and not relevant to the topic really, just explaining why things are happening.
Without going into too much detail because it would turn into a novel... The temple isn't the reason the lake is dry. This entire world experienced severe global warming which lasted for more than a thousand years. The only human civilization existed around a small sea located at the planet's north pole. The world was almost entirely desert except for a few islands with the last of the world's trees and farms. If you traveled south for less than a hundred miles it would get unbearably hot, eventually the heat would begin dealing fire damage. As a result the southern lands were inhabited by fire creatures, there is an empire of salamanders and a colony from the city of brass and a LOT of red and gold dragons. In the last adventure we put a stop to the situation that was causing this warming and cooled the planet to normal levels. In doing so we also inadvertently pulled up an entire city from hell and an entire city from heaven, when they hit the material plane these cities and their inhabitants were flung all around the world. Now we have just begun our epic level adventure, trying to mitigate the damage dealt by fixing the last major problem that affected this world while dealing with new problems that are popping up, such as a demon lord who was just minding his own business one day when all of a sudden he, his minions, his fortress of suffering and entire abyssal city that surrounded it were pulled with deific force out of the abyss and plopped right down in the middle of a desert on the material plane (only the fortress survived this, every non magical unattended object was destroyed and every creature and their gear as well as every unattended magic item was scattered across the material plane).

[Someonelse]

Have a Cleric cast Persist War Flash Flood. That is 5.76 trillion gallons of water in one casting over the course of one day. If you get it cast as a Circle Spell, 11.52 trillion gallons.

Wizard casting Circle War Fimbulwinter Maximize and Widen. Assuming all variable numeric effects are maximized and not just the ones you roll for, also using a snow water density of about 12.5%(for ease of calculations), you get 17.83 trillion gallons over 48 days.

That sounds like the best answer yet. Can you please give references? I'm not familiar with those, are they feats? spells? magic items?

[Gildedragon]

War spells are... Not quite a metamagic feat but something like it. They are pricey tho.
They are Dragon 314

[Ruethgar]

That sounds like the best answer yet. Can you please give references? I'm not familiar with those, are they feats? spells? magic items?

Circle Magic is from Forgotten Realms and allows you to increase the caster level of a spell up to 40 but has some prep work. War spells come from Dragon Magazine 309 and require a three feat tax to cast however they create 25*Caster level of whatever creatures or objects the spell creates, in this case water for the spell Flash Flood from Sandstorm, and snow for the spell Fimbulwinter from Frostburn.

In order for a cleric to cast the flood, he needs to be a Divine Metamagic:Persist focused Cleric of which there are a plethora of builds for on this and other sites. The Wizard would be harder to do, but could manage to squeeze out with Divine Metamagic by consuming most of his feats or go the route of Incanatrix and Metaphysical Meldshaper to capitalize on metamagic reductions.

The snow density is highly variable and it has proven difficult to find a good average ratio. 12.5% makes it about 8* the volume of water. Since in D&D 1ft cubed holds 8 gallons I thought it was a good number to go from for ease of calculations.

Edit: As to the above post. Dragon 314 has primarily to do with elementalism and the only other thing worth much note are the additional item sets introduced.

[Sir Chuckles]

The main reason we want to flood it out is so this abyssal army cannot use this temple as a rallying point. We are also a bunch of environmentalist tree hugger types and we want to heal this land, which begins by bringing water to the desert and refilling this lake.

So what you're saying is mass amounts of powdered explosives and/or molten lead are completely out of the question?

[Gildedragon]

Fill it with lava then. lotsandlotsa lava, then water
Have a geyser!

Old Baneful you can call it

Or generate a thaumogeothermal powersource
Avoid your fantasy world from using oil.
Hit Peak Evil Temple in a few decades.

[Coidzor]

So what you're saying is mass amounts of powdered explosives and/or molten lead are completely out of the question?

Nah, just adds to the cleanup bill. Can't be giving those fishies lead poisoning now.

[ericgrau]

Any sort of magical water source is not enough and any small opening to a water source is not enough to even fill a small dungeon rapidly. What you need is a far larger opening to an existing non-magical water source. Assuming 10 feet of pressure you can get 25 feet per second water velocity. 100 feet of pressure gives 250 feet per second water velocity. That's 1500 and 15,000 feet per minute. Each 5 foot square is then good for covering 300 and 3,000 5 foot cubes in a minute. Which is a 60'x60'x10' dungeon and a 195'x195'x10' dungeon.

So it seems reasonable for a gate spell with a 10' circular ring to flood about a 200'x200'x10' dungeon assuming the plane of water is not under pressure and you place the gate above the dry lake bed to get some gravity. For a greater amount of water you could make a trench to the ocean or lake with a move earth spell. Each ~4 hour casting is good for a 150' wide x 10' deep x 3750' long trench. The tricky part would be what to do as you get close to the lake bed. Depends whether or not the foe has scouts or other vision outside the dungeon. If they're bunkered up inside and oblivious to the outside world, then by the time the water comes in it would be too late for them. This method would be good for around a 800'x800'x10' dungeon. Natural changes in elevation might also make this method difficult because then you would need a deeper trench meaning many more castings of move earth in some areas. Or if there's a mountain range between the base and the ocean then forget it.

[Graypairofsocks]

Maybe a Create Water or other spell Spell Clock (http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/cw/20070312a)?


Also, the Arms & Equipment Guide has the Eversoaking Sponge. Just get some of those, find an actual body of water, and throw them at the Evil Lair.

The Sponge releases only as much water as a normal sponge would hold, not as much as it absorbed.


The main reason we want to flood it out is so this abyssal army cannot use this temple as a rallying point. We are also a bunch of environmentalist tree hugger types and we want to heal this land, which begins by bringing water to the desert and refilling this lake.

Depending on if your DM has Fiend Folio this may not stop him, as there are also aquatic demons (http://www.wizards.com/dnd/images/ff_gallery/50077.jpg).

[draconomial]

Unaccompanied objects cannot travel through a gate. Not spells, nor ammunition.

[Sir Chuckles]

Unaccompanied objects cannot travel through a gate. Not spells, nor ammunition.

Awaken the mass of boiling lead before sending it through.

[Vedhin]

Unaccompanied objects cannot travel through a gate. Not spells, nor ammunition.

Phytoplankton and zooplankton to the rescue!

[Curmudgeon]

Awaken the mass of boiling lead before sending it through.
How? It's not an Animal or tree. It's not a Construct. It's not a mindless Undead. It's not sand or similar material. I think those are all the things you can awaken. Did I miss one?

[Vedhin]

How? It's not an Animal or tree. It's not a Construct. It's not a mindless Undead. It's not sand or similar material. I think those are all the things you can awaken. Did I miss one?

Awaken Ooze in a Dragon Magazine.

I think he means Animate Object though.