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View Full Version : Various Uses of Explosive Runes



goto124
2014-12-28, 12:48 PM
The OotS comic has shown V's creative uses of Explosive Runes (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/explosiveRunes.htm), which includes:

- To get rid of goblins who were after the party (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0092.html)

- Something about making Belkar angry at him/her (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0221.html), I'm not sure.

- On a fake ticket (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0173.html), to get a horse

- To stop Xykon from (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0659.html) getting his phylactery (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0660.html)

- On a container of delibrately socked coffee (http://www.giantitp.com/comics/oots0317.html) (Good to the last boom!)

It made me wonder: what other ways could there be, to use ER?

You're free to discuss both serious and non-serious uses of the spell.

Perhaps... what if I use it to put ASCII art? Does that sound as the runes being 'read'?

saxavarius
2014-12-29, 07:40 PM
create a ton of pages filled with explosive runes and pass out flyers in the City Of Bad People

Throw those same pages into the middle of the Evil Cultists Inc. meeting and area dispel

Booby trap your spellbook (runes doesn't damage what it is on)

ward your whole tower

make a pit trap with runes all over the walls and set to chain trigger (somehow)

make arrow-note-bombs

AmewTheFox
2014-12-29, 08:19 PM
make arrow-note-bombs

"They mocked me when I took Craft (Paper Airplanes), but who's taking 6d6 Force damage now!?"

DoctorGlock
2014-12-29, 09:13 PM
Booby trap your spellbook (runes doesn't damage what it is on)


Is there a source for this? I am playing a wizard and I'd like something a little more final than the illusions I currently use

Jormengand
2014-12-29, 09:36 PM
My brother's friend made an ER-cannon, which spawned a celestial or fiendish hamster (cel/fie so it could read) on the inside with Explosive Runes.

My favourite trick, however, is:
DM: You read the runes. They say "I prepared explosive runes this morning."
*Players tense up in anticipation of taking 6d6 damage.*
DM: roll spellcraft
*Tension escalates as each player rolls spellcraft, not sure why they're rolling...*
DM: You recognise numerous instances...
*Players look in some combination of disdain and horror*
DM: ...of the spell Arcane Mark.
*Audible sigh of relief.*

I may not be casting it, but I'm certainly using it. :smallbiggrin:


Is there a source for this? I am playing a wizard and I'd like something a little more final than the illusions I currently use

Outa luck:


The object on which the runes were written also takes full damage (no saving throw).

AmewTheFox
2014-12-29, 10:23 PM
My brother's friend made an ER-cannon, which spawned a celestial or fiendish hamster (cel/fie so it could read) on the inside with Explosive Runes.

My favourite trick, however, is:
DM: You read the runes. They say "I prepared explosive runes this morning."
*Players tense up in anticipation of taking 6d6 damage.*
DM: roll spellcraft
*Tension escalates as each player rolls spellcraft, not sure why they're rolling...*
DM: You recognise numerous instances...
*Players look in some combination of disdain and horror*
DM: ...of the spell Arcane Mark.
*Audible sigh of relief.*

I may not be casting it, but I'm certainly using it. :smallbiggrin:


Don't the rules of Arcane Mark say it can only be six characters?

Jay R
2014-12-29, 10:48 PM
Little tiny writing on the wall, right next to a lever:
"No, the lever is not a trap. But these words are."

Jormengand
2014-12-29, 11:20 PM
Don't the rules of Arcane Mark say it can only be six characters?

Hence multiple castings.

YossarianLives
2014-12-30, 12:21 AM
Summoning a herd of horses using mount. Attaching pieces of paper to them using stick. Casting explosive runes on the paper. Then making the horses stampede at our enemies.

Zwinmar
2014-12-30, 01:59 AM
Behind the last sheet on the toilet paper roll: "yer screwed"

The Hanged Man
2014-12-30, 12:01 PM
I had a Wizard/Fighter who was a weird experiment in maximizing touch spells via unarmed combat feats. He was Chaotic Neutral, and this was 3E, so multiclassing to Monk wasn't an option. He belonged to a school of mages that advocated personal advancement by hurling one's self boldly into challenges (loosely based on House Tytalus from Ars Magica/Mage: the Ascension). So he spent a lot of time picking bar fights and hassling relatively peaceful monstrous humanoids, in between doing jobs for the Adventurer's Guild. Eventually, he got tired of starting his own fights, and hired a couple bards to spread some rumors that would help bring the fights to him.

One of those rumors was that his glass eye (he lost the original knife fighting a gnoll) was a powerful oracular device. He was hoping to avenge himself with a variant of the old Fake Eye of Vecna scam, if he ever got killed or disabled. But just in case his opponent wasn't so dumb as to cut their own eye out before removing and examining his glass eye, he put Explosive Rune on the back of it.

Sadly, he was killed by a Beholder, who had plenty of eyes and no need to scavenge an extra from him.

saxavarius
2014-12-30, 05:53 PM
My bad, I was thinking of the fire trap spell.

themaque
2014-12-30, 05:56 PM
I had a wizard who would cast it on a coinpurse when traveling in big cities.

"Don't steal from Wizards. BOOM"

Jormengand
2014-12-30, 06:34 PM
I had a wizard who would cast it on a coinpurse when traveling in big cities.

"Don't steal from Wizards. BOOM"

It's like if Haley and V had a kid...

AmewTheFox
2014-12-30, 07:54 PM
On a big banner and have something disposable ride into an enemy army. Remember: "Damages "anyone close enough to read them" so can damage creatures very far away if they have spyglasses or the like" (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?267985-Completely-Dysfunctional-Handbook-3-5&p=14536851#post14536851)

So sit back, and watch BOOMIES unfold.

Vitruviansquid
2014-12-30, 08:41 PM
Sneak up to an enemy's castle. Put Explosive runes on the ground, and have the most hulked out, survivable fighter in the group stand on it and read it while jumping, propelling him onto the battlements. He then fights his way to the gatehouse, and opens the gates for the rest of the party.

Forrestfire
2014-12-30, 09:08 PM
My favorite use of explosive runes has always been stickers with dozens or hundreds of castings of explosive runes on them. Just fill your slots with the spell during downtime and keep anyone else from reading them... Then have the rogue carry around a dispel magic wand as the detonator.

You've basically got sticky blocks of magic C4 that deal hundreds of dice of force damage to blocks of stuff. Blow holes in walls, collapse buildings, trap bridges... Just don't use it against enemies, since it's likely to get the DM to smack you with a book :smalltongue:

Andrian
2014-12-30, 09:18 PM
Step 1: cast explosive runes on a barrel of gunpowder
Step 2: take said barrel and stack it with other barrels of gunpowder in a strategic place.
Step 3: Move far away and wait for enemies to find the large cache of gunpowder.
Step 4: Hand your spyglass to the ranger and ask him to read the runes.
Step 5: Grab the loot as it rains from the sky.

Ammendment to Step 4: hand the spyglass to whichever party member you like the least

Milodiah
2014-12-30, 11:40 PM
The walls, floor, and even ceiling of the room are tiled mosaics. Images of the ocean, the sun, and the moon abound, along with an inscription that appears dozens of times around the room that presents a clever riddle (which, in case they somehow didn't notice, is also recited by a Magic Mouth). The room contains several torches, pools and mirrors, appearing at first glance to be a complex puzzle.

However, halfway through all the riddle-tiles lapse into Explosive Runes, blowing them apart as the Magic Mouth reaches that point and spraying the PCs with ceramic shrapnel.

Behind the tiles are black spots. Black spots that are actually holes. Holes that are actually chutes. What's coming down the chutes?




OWLBEARS. SO MANY OWLBEARS.

Lord Torath
2014-12-31, 11:01 AM
My favorite use of explosive runes has always been stickers with dozens or hundreds of castings of explosive runes on them. Just fill your slots with the spell during downtime and keep anyone else from reading them... Then have the rogue carry around a dispel magic wand as the detonator.Huh. Dispel Magic Detonates them? In 2E AD&D, Dispel Magic was one safe way of defusing them (Erase was the other). How times change.

Forrestfire
2014-12-31, 12:42 PM
Dispel Magic and Erase can defuse them in 3.5, but you have to roll a caster level check. If you fail, boom.

Milodiah
2015-01-02, 05:34 PM
I just pictured an OotS-style bomb squad sequence.

Could you "jam the signal" with a Silence spell? I've never been clear on how it works, is it read the runes or recite the runes?

Either way, you could cordon off the area and prevent accidental detonation with magic darkness centered on the "bomb", with "EOD" personnel using anti-magic-darkness to see what they're doing.

Honest Tiefling
2015-01-02, 08:24 PM
Cover any paper and all paper like substances in outhouses with the spell.

And then convince your druid friend to plant poison ivy near any concealing bushes with soft leaves...

goto124
2015-01-03, 02:28 AM
Could you "jam the signal" with a Silence spell? I've never been clear on how it works, is it read the runes or recite the runes?

It would be way too easy to avoid the explosion of Explosive Runes if you had to say it out loud. Many people are capable of reading silently after all :smallamused:

Laughingmanlol
2015-01-03, 04:36 AM
It would be way too easy to avoid the explosion of Explosive Runes if you had to say it out loud. Many people are capable of reading silently after all :smallamused:

Although interestingly, it was considered remarkable that Saint Augustine could read silently - at the time, everyone else did just read aloud.

Milodiah
2015-01-04, 05:02 AM
It would be way too easy to avoid the explosion of Explosive Runes if you had to say it out loud. Many people are capable of reading silently after all :smallamused:



...that's what I was asking.

Vhaidara
2015-01-04, 12:07 PM
I think my favorite one was this
Character: Sir Eorin Pendelton, Explosive Rune focused Sorcerer going incognito to infiltrate a cult
Fool: A guard for said cult

We were finishing up our investigation with the usual "Go purge the cult base" mission. So we walk in and the guards ask us our business. Eorin hands him a letter, which he reads and it explodes.
Fool: WTF man!
Eorin: Whoops, that one was meant for a traitor! Sorry, here's your orders!
*hands him another letter*
BOOM.

Yes, he got 2 off on the same guy.

illyahr
2015-01-06, 02:11 PM
Keep a bunch of paper with Explosive Runes on them and give them to the Barbarian. Have the Barbarian "read" the paper to prove it's not Explosive Runes before handing them over (Barbarians are illiterate so they can't trigger the runes) :smallbiggrin:

EyethatBinds
2015-01-06, 02:19 PM
Keep a bunch of paper with Explosive Runes on them and give them to the Barbarian. Have the Barbarian "read" the paper to prove it's not Explosive Runes before handing them over (Barbarians are illiterate so they can't trigger the runes) :smallbiggrin:

I was going to throw in the barbarians myself, but differently. Use the horn of Valhalla to summon barbarians and stick dozens of explosive runes stickers to them, then have them charge the enemy. They explode when directly looked at if you use large enough print. They'll explode in melee range if you use small print.

The barbarians will get angrier at the foe for making them explode.

Segev
2015-01-06, 02:46 PM
This is of questionable functionality, as the reasoning for why it works is not always agreed to by DMs (or fellow players), however...

Unseen Servants can perform any task which does not have a DC higher than 10. This means they can read. Hand a scrip with Explosive Runes to each of a number of Unseen Servants. Have them walk up next to your target, and read the runes simultaneously.

Milodiah
2015-01-07, 12:17 PM
I was going to throw in the barbarians myself, but differently. Use the horn of Valhalla to summon barbarians and stick dozens of explosive runes stickers to them, then have them charge the enemy. They explode when directly looked at if you use large enough print. They'll explode in melee range if you use small print.

The barbarians will get angrier at the foe for making them explode.


A friend of mine has perfected the BadgermineTM, a device which, when triggered, uses the Summon Monster spells to bring in a swarm of celestial dire badgers, and then pops them on the butt with a Mass Inflict Minor Wounds to trigger the frenzy effect.

Most terrifying home defense system I've ever seen.

khadgar567
2015-01-09, 06:04 AM
personal favorite throwing knives/ axes of explosive rune thinks like miss attack and kaboom

Metahuman1
2015-01-09, 03:25 PM
I like to just tell my enemy's "One last little matter before we begin." and use prestidigitation to pass them a letter that has a casting or two of it on the paper.

They take a nasty hit as a free bee at the start of the fight, which doesn't normally kill them unless they were far less powerful then we thought, but does soften them up a fair bit.

Segev
2015-01-09, 04:39 PM
I like to just tell my enemy's "One last little matter before we begin." and use prestidigitation to pass them a letter that has a casting or two of it on the paper.

They take a nasty hit as a free bee at the start of the fight, which doesn't normally kill them unless they were far less powerful then we thought, but does soften them up a fair bit.

Why are they foolish enough to pause and take your floating piece of paper? Even without the runes, it would be a distraction and you could try something while they messed with it.

Metahuman1
2015-01-09, 04:47 PM
I usually like to fluff it as me giving them some official correspondence or as some bit of Intel they want.

Did I mention i like to invest heavily in Bluff?