How many hit points does the earth have? Estimating it.

[gooddragon1]

I googled, and saw 1 thread which gave no actual answer. Well, I want to apply some very "back of the envelope" calculations to get an overestimate. Feel free to refine on the estimate. (I'm assuming that the hit points of the earth can be calculated by looking at it's "thickness")

Let's pretend pi = 3.
Let's pretend the earth is made of solid iron (hardness 10, hp 30/inch).
Let's pretend the circumference of the earth is exactly 27000 miles (it's less).

The circumference of an object = pi x diameter.

27000 = 3 x Diameter.
27000/3 = 9000 miles in diameter.

9000*5280= 47520000 feet.
47520000 * 12 = 570240000 inches.
570240000 * 30 = 17,107,200,000 hit points.

At the very least, this means you would need to deal around 17 billion damage to go through the earth (if it were made of solid iron). So, a rough estimate of the earth's hit points is 17 billion. At least from some calculations I made.

Another possible calculation.

Maybe it would be better to just calculate it by the hit points of a 1 foot cube of iron and then extrapolate that outwards. A big tree has 600 hp. If we assumed a 1 foot cube of iron had 1000 hp and we made a big cube with sides of 10000 miles each...

10000*5280 = 52800000 feet on each side.
52800000^3 ~= 1.5e+23 = 150,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 cubes.
150,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 * 1000 hp = 150,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 hp.

Probably a way overestimate (since I basically packed the entire hit points of a very big tree almost twice into a 1 foot cube of iron (wood has 10 hp/inch vs 30 hp/inch)). 150 septillion hitpoints.

Next, I'm going to try to calculate an epic spell that could destroy such an object.

Energy Seed Psionic Power (cuz psionics is cool).
I'm definitely overestimating if damage is dealt to each part of the object, but let's go for it anyways.
DC 19 Base
Hide visual display = +4
Change area to 4 10 foot cubes = +2
Quickened = +28
Range improvement to 1,000,000 miles = +35200000
Sonic Damage Type = +0
Improve damage to 150000000000000000000000020d6 = +300000000000000000000000020
Improve area to 10000 mile cubes from 10 foot cubes = +21120000
Increase Spell Penetration by 1000000 = +2000000
Increase Resist by 1000000 = +2000000

Total DC 300,000,000,000,000,000,062,320,073

A bit over 300 septillion. I just love back of the envelope calculations.

[Saintheart]

I'm pretty sure there's some Hulking Hurler builds that could do that with a Sunder check.

[Nifft]

The question doesn't have an answer because the question doesn't make sense.

A tree can be killed. Dead trees are a thing which can happen. So a tree has hit points to determine how hard it is to kill.

What would it mean to "kill the Earth"?

Just scour all life from the surface? That sounds like a thing which could be calculated.

[Lord Lemming]

The question doesn't have an answer because the question doesn't make sense.

A tree can be killed. Dead trees are a thing which can happen. So a tree has hit points to determine how hard it is to kill.

What would it mean to "kill the Earth"?

Just scour all life from the surface? That sounds like a thing which could be calculated.

In D&D, inanimate objects also have hit points. For instance, if I'm remembering this correctly, a rapier has 2 hit points plus 10 hardness. So by dealing 12 points of damage, you can destroy the rapier, even though it isn't alive. The OP is just applying this principle to the entire planet.

EDIT: Basically, he's trying to figure out how much damage the Death Star would have to do in order to destroy the planet.

[Nifft]

In D&D, inanimate objects also have hit points. For instance, if I'm remembering this correctly, a rapier has 2 hit points plus 10 hardness. So by dealing 12 points of damage, you can destroy the rapier, even though it isn't alive. The OP is just applying this principle to the entire planet. Right. That's what fails to make sense.

Planets generally don't have rigid structural integrity to begin with.

I mean, imagine chopping Jupiter or the Sun in half. What's going to happen? Nothing.

[Lord Lemming]

Right. That's what fails to make sense.

Planets generally don't have rigid structural integrity to begin with.

I mean, imagine chopping Jupiter or the Sun in half. What's going to happen? Nothing.

Very true; in the real world not a whole lot would happen (assuming you used a thin enough blade. Taking out a meter-wide slice of the Earth would cause a lot of very bad stuff to happen).

However, this is not the real world we are talking about.

Here, we are talking about a world where a squishy meatbag of a human being with absolutely no magical or otherwise extraordinary traits about him can be hit by a spell capable of utterly annihilating a 10x10x10 ft cube of solid iron (disintegrate), and survive, with little more harm to himself than we would suffer from stubbing a toe.

EDIT: My point is that the insanity cannot be reasoned with. Just roll with it. :smalltongue:

[Troacctid]

It's a trick question. Objects of that size are damaged in sections, so you can't destroy it all at once.

[AmberVael]

When it comes to large objects and terrain, D&D rarely models them as a single entity. For example, when attacking Wall of Stone (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/wallOfStone.htm) there is no single attack that will take out the entire thing- you attack it in sections, and each section has its own separate amount of hit points. Something as big and diverse in composition as an entire planet would almost certainly be modeled in the same way. Each patch of dirt and stone, each volume of water and magma will have its own stats and hit points.

Which also makes destroying the entire planet in one go hard. Not only will it be difficult to completely engulf it in an area attack, but even if you do, you'll really just be destroying the top layer of the planet rather than the entire thing. Which, I mean, destroying the entire planet crust and a significant portion of the ice caps and possibly evaporating a significant portion of ocean won't exactly leave the planet in a good state, but if the plan is to leave some dust or a pile of fragments, you'll need something clever.

[Hrugner]

Destroying the planet couldn't be done with mere hitpoint damage. You need to disperse it or annihilate matter.

http://www.stardestroyer.net/Empire/Tech/Beam/DeathStar.html

[Saintheart]

Could you Iron Heart Surge the planet away? Gravity's an effect lasting more than 1 round, and if you cancel that out, gravity no longer affecting the Earth, would it then allow each of the Earth's constituent pieces to head off in the myriad of directions they were travelling in consistent with Newton's First Law?

[Mechalich]

Just scour all life from the surface? That sounds like a thing which could be calculated.

And is actually a relevant question for certain Star Wars games.

That probably amounts to a question of how much energy you need to inject into the troposphere in order to raise the temperature above 100 C, which would certainly suffice to kill all terrestrial life and certainly do enough horrible things to the oceans that life would cease there in most regions.

I suspect there's an XKCD What if post with some numbers that approximate it.

[Troacctid]

Could you Iron Heart Surge the planet away? Gravity's an effect lasting more than 1 round, and if you cancel that out, gravity no longer affecting the Earth, would it then allow each of the Earth's constituent pieces to head off in the myriad of directions they were travelling in consistent with Newton's First Law?

No. Gravity is not an effect or condition, and it has no duration.

[gooddragon1]

Destroying the planet couldn't be done with mere hitpoint damage. You need to disperse it or annihilate matter.

http://www.stardestroyer.net/Empire/Tech/Beam/DeathStar.html

Actually, if you look at the epic power in the first post, you may note that it deals damage equal to the entire HP of the planet if it were cube shaped and larger and made of iron. Much of the planet is significantly less durable than iron (and very little of it is more durable than such iron). The cube of sonic energy generated by the mentioned psionic power should blast the planet into it's individual particles.

[Nifft]

However, this is not the real world we are talking about. Earth is not your real world?


When it comes to large objects and terrain, D&D rarely models them as a single entity. For example, when attacking Wall of Stone (http://www.d20srd.org/srd/spells/wallOfStone.htm) there is no single attack that will take out the entire thing- you attack it in sections, and each section has its own separate amount of hit points. Something as big and diverse in composition as an entire planet would almost certainly be modeled in the same way. Each patch of dirt and stone, each volume of water and magma will have its own stats and hit points.

Which also makes destroying the entire planet in one go hard. Not only will it be difficult to completely engulf it in an area attack, but even if you do, you'll really just be destroying the top layer of the planet rather than the entire thing. Which, I mean, destroying the entire planet crust and a significant portion of the ice caps and possibly evaporating a significant portion of ocean won't exactly leave the planet in a good state, but if the plan is to leave some dust or a pile of fragments, you'll need something clever. Yeah, good points.

One thing that might be calculable: how hard would it be to Telekinesis the Earth into lots of little bits, each of which was far enough apart that another Earth wouldn't just re-form swiftly? Mass calculations ought to be a lot easier than hit points.

[ben-zayb]

Why wait for epic when +NI damage schticks are already available, and at least one of them at level 1 earliest?

^re: Telekinesis vs Earth: The first thing to do would probably find a way to negate the earth's weight. Maybe teleport it to the Astral plane?

[Hrugner]

All he's doing is pumping energy into the planet without giving it a reason to disperse or annihilating matter. He could turn it into a giant fireball shedding heat and atmosphere, but destroying it requires some sort of dispersal effect for the material that won't turn to gas. Even if the end result is "disintegrated" that's still a dust cloud with the same amount of matter, all sitting where the planet had been forced together by gravity. If the effect spread knocked everything outward far enough that the objects would float into the sun or out into space, then cool, but we would need that effect included.

[gooddragon1]

All he's doing is pumping energy into the planet without giving it a reason to disperse or annihilating matter. He could turn it into a giant fireball shedding heat and atmosphere, but destroying it requires some sort of dispersal effect for the material that won't turn to gas. Even if the end result is "disintegrated" that's still a dust cloud with the same amount of matter, all sitting where the planet had been forced together by gravity. If the effect spread knocked everything outward far enough that the objects would float into the sun or out into space, then cool, but we would need that effect included.

Well, I'm not sure, but I think that the power would deal damage to everything (particle by particle) within the area of effect. A 10d6 maximized fireball with 3 enemies in the area does 60 damage to each of those enemies (provided they fail their save). Thus, dealing 1.5 septillion damage to each thing particle by particle should separate connections between the particles. I suppose an ad hoc could be included to cause each particle to be propelled a distance proportional to the damage dealt. Would that be ad hoc +20 psicraft dc :P?

[AvatarVecna]

The best methods of destroying the planet don't care about specific amounts of HP, they care about time. Whether it's putting a Sphere of Annihilation at the planet's Core, chain-gating Efreeti and using your infinite Wishes to replicate infinite Disintegrates, infecting a Necropolitan Hulking Hurler/Cancer Mage with Festering Anger and keeping them alive long enough to eventually hurl the planet ~100 ft away from the sun every round, a Vermin Keeper with Dark Speech giving tons of spells and high Intelligence/Charisma to vermin swarms and asking them politely (using both Vermin Empathy and the free Suggestion) to wreak havoc on the world, creating a Gate to the Fire Plane and then setting up (on the other side and directly facing the previous Gate) a Gate leading to the surface of the Sun on the Material Plane, or a blaster-focused TO-level CL 20 Incantatrix taking a day to cast an Empower'd Maximize'd Widen'd Twin'd Repeat'd City'd Invisible'd Sanctum'd Transdimensional'd Apocalypse From The Sky while under the effects of a Persistent Reserves of Strength'd Greater Consumptive Field after running across an unmodified Wasp Swarm (dealing 20d6+240 sonic/city damage to everything within 200000 miles), it's not a question of if you can destroy the entire planet, but when.

[Killer Angel]

What would it mean to "kill the Earth"?

Just scour all life from the surface? That sounds like a thing which could be calculated.

for that, you only need a wight apocalypse.

[Inevitability]

Let's pretend pi = 3.

BLASPHEMEEEE! *Runs off to get torch and pitfork*

[Nifft]

^re: Telekinesis vs Earth: The first thing to do would probably find a way to negate the earth's weight. Maybe teleport it to the Astral plane?

Heh.

If you can teleport the whole planet, just do that and claim you destroyed the Earth. Sell tickets for interested parties to watch from the safety of the moon.

Or, just teleport half of the Earth somewhere else. Doesn't really matter which half.


for that, you only need a wight apocalypse.

The Warforged shall inherit the Earth.

[AvatarVecna]

The Warforged shall inherit the Earth.

I'll just repeat myself: Sphere of Annihilation at the Earth's Core.

[hamishspence]

How exactly would that work? If the sphere has zero effective mass, won't there come a point where there is a shell of rock, an empty space, and a sphere at the centre?

[AvatarVecna]

How exactly would that work? If the sphere has zero effective mass, won't there come a point where there is a shell of rock, an empty space, and a sphere at the centre?

Each side of the rock shell is still exerting gravity on the the other side, drawing them together. Eventually, yes, the force of gravity wouldn't be enough to draw it towards the "center" where the sphere is, but by that point, the planet will have significantly changed in size, resulting in some pretty odd things going on for everybody living on said planet. And that's assuming gravity works the way it's supposed to.

And of course, let's not forget that, if you're at the point where you're able to put one of these babies at the planet's core without a high-level wizard wasting you, you've got to be an even higher level wizard. Ignoring all the faster and easier ways a high-level wizard could destroy the Earth, they could make themselves ethereal and immune to fire, allowing them to control the Sphere from close by to maneuever towards whatever it didn't originally eat up. Sure, it would take some time, but you've got a Sphere of Annihilation; eventually, everything will be destroyed.

[hamishspence]

Each side of the rock shell is still exerting gravity on the the other side, drawing them together.

Objects inside a hollow sphere experience zero net gravity though:

https://www.grc.nasa.gov/www/k-12/Numbers/Math/Mathematical_Thinking/grvtysp.htm

[AvatarVecna]

Objects inside a hollow sphere experience zero net gravity though:

https://www.grc.nasa.gov/www/k-12/Numbers/Math/Mathematical_Thinking/grvtysp.htm

I'm aware; however, that only means that the SoA in the very center is experiencing zero G; the rock shell (the hollow sphere) is still there, and each side is still exerting gravity on the other side at that scale. A hollow sphere the size of a baseball will maintain its structure; a hollow sphere the size of a planet crumples in on itself to fill the hollow void.

EDIT: I will admit, however, that my grasp of how gravitational forces work in such a situation is questionable at best, and mostly based on gut feeling (namely, that such a large structure must have mass all the way through, or it will collapse until the mass-less area is filled). That said, what exactly happens in this kind of situation might be better answered in the science sub-forum, so away I go!

[hamishspence]

I'm aware; however, that only means that the SoA in the very center is experiencing zero G; the rock shell (the hollow sphere) is still there, and each side is still exerting gravity on the other side at that scale.

The impression I got was that it's zero throughout the empty space. So you can't stand on the "inner surface - you will float.

Think of it as a Dyson shell - but with no star at the centre:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyson_sphere#Dyson_shell

[AvatarVecna]

The impression I got was that it's zero throughout the empty space. So you can't stand on the "inner surface - you will float.

Think of it as a Dyson shell - but with no star at the centre:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dyson_sphere#Dyson_shell

Again, not an expert, but here's my thoughts on the subject:

Just because the mass at the exact center is gone doesn't mean that the rest of the remaining matter isn't exerting gravity on you. The reason the effective gravitational force is net Zero at the exact center is because all the planet's mass is still pulling on you, but because you're at the exact center, each individual pull is balanced out by another pull in the exact opposite direction. If you're not exactly at the center of the Earth (where this hypothetical Sphere of Annihilation is lying in wait), you will still experience a gravitational force pulling you to the center of the Earth, even if that pull is slightly less strong than it was before (due to a 2 ft diameter sphere of matter being missing).

[hamishspence]

See my response in the new thread in the science section.

[Yuki Akuma]

If the sphere is uniformly dense, the edge closest to you will be exerting more gravitational force than the edge furthest from you. Given the right diameter, everything inside the sphere would be effectively weightless, but I don't believe it's true for every single possible sphere.

And anyway, planets aren't spheres. Or uniformly dense.

[AvatarVecna]

The impression I got was that it's zero throughout the empty space. So you can't stand on the "inner surface - you will float.

Also, while it's definitely zero acceleration within the hollow itself, that doesn't stop the acceleration that was previously effecting a mass from continuing at the velocity it was accelerated to. For instance, if the Earth was actually hollow, and there was a large hole leading down to that hollow, and I dropped a pebble down that hole, the pebble would accelerate all the way down; that acceleration would decrease the further down it went, but that just means that its falling speed isn't increasing as quickly, not that its falling speed is decreasing.

In a similar manner, if it then entered that hollow area, it would be experiencing zero acceleration, but according to Newton's laws (I forget which one at the moment) "an object in motion will stay in motion unless acted upon by an outside force, and vice versa"; since the pebble was moving towards the center point when it entered zero acceleration land, it will continue moving towards the center point until a force acts upon it. And the same goes for the rocks that make up the outside of the hollow.

EDIT: Incidentally, my lack of expertise on this matter has lead me to make a post on the subject in the appropriate sub-forum.

[hamishspence]

Maybe we could carry on the more physics-y discussion in that thread?

http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?430019-D-amp-D-Physics-What-happens

[Tvtyrant]

Destroying a planet is fairly trivial if a group of adventurers doesn't show up to stop you. Fly to the opposite side of the planet's orbit, make a permanent wall of force with a 1 cl magic trap which creates a small wall of iron on the wall of force each round. Since theae are not anchored but are on a level surface they randomly fall over. You get 2,628,000 walls of iron floating in the planet's path by the end of half of a year. Each one will destroy a 5 ft. Cube but will also be destroyed by fall damage, so over some years it will destroy the planet.

[noob]

Just be a level 15 wizard and use the spell from libris mortis who increase your strength of 2 per person in the negative near you(that get killed by this spell) and have 50000 chickens fall to the ground and fall in the negatives near you and then grab the earth and teleport to the sun.
Congratulations you destroyed earth with a level 15 wizard and two spells and 50000 chickens you made fall.

[danzibr]

I find it interesting that pretty much nobody is talking about the calculations in the OP, but rather discussing how useless it is or methods of destroying the Earth.

[Nifft]

strength of 2 per person in the negative near you(that get killed by this spell) and have 50000 chickens fall

Today I learned that chickens are people.


Delicious people.

[noob]

I did read the spell again and it said creature.
And yes I believe that dnd chicken are dnd people and that killing them is evil and even more if you do it for becoming strong enough for lifting earth and teleporting into the sun.

[Abithrios]

I did read the spell again and it said creature.
And yes I believe that dnd chicken are dnd people and that killing them is evil and even more if you do it for becoming strong enough for lifting earth and teleporting into the sun.

Not sure about "people", but most things with "person" in the name (e.g. charm person) affect only humanoids, a category that doesn't include animals or vermin. It seems likely to me that chickens would be included in the animal type.

Describing the killing of chickens as evil is controversial, especially if people eat them afterwards. On the other hand, it would take a lot of prep or weird circumstances for destroying Earth to be unambiguously non-evil.

[Hrugner]

I find it interesting that pretty much nobody is talking about the calculations in the OP, but rather discussing how useless it is or methods of destroying the Earth.

Well, mostly due to the fact that HP damage simply won't do much good, since a planet is self organizing. So we'd need a few other stats like regen and hardness before working on HP. The question ends up being, what exactly is the part of the planet that needs to be shut down to stop it being planety. Maybe a planet has few HP but very few effective weapons, that sort of thing.

[AvatarVecna]

Not sure about "people", but most things with "person" in the name (e.g. charm person) affect only humanoids, a category that doesn't include animals or vermin. It seems likely to me that chickens would be included in the animal type.

Describing the killing of chickens as evil is controversial, especially if people eat them afterwards. On the other hand, it would take a lot of prep or weird circumstances for destroying Earth to be unambiguously non-evil.

Rather irrelevant when you consider that spell says "creature" and doesn't say "people" or "person" anywhere.

Also, it doesn't take that many chickens, and chickens are a bad creature to use (swarms are better, because killing them is hundreds or thousands of creatures dying). You only need Str 394 for the Earth to be within your maximum load, which is all Greater Teleport requires (Teleport doesn't suffice because of its range limit), and a single rat swarm would give 600 Str before adding your starting Str, giving you plenty of capacity to TP the Earth wherever you want.

Also, I too find it amusing that so many people are ignoring the OP's calculations because there's more efficient and non-HP based methods of destroying the world. It's like Whose Line Is It Anyway: everything's made up, and the (hit) points don't matter!

[Azoth]

Random thought on killing the planet based on HP damage. Most Line attacks can tinue for their length even if obstructed by a barrier. So theoretically, if you could get a line attack long enough to reach the core of the planet (or punch out the other side for that matter), wouldn't it then just have to do enough damage to destroy the 5ft or 10ft subsections of the planet in a straight shot. I wonder what affect it would have on a planet to have its core suddenly exposed?

[AvatarVecna]

Random thought on killing the planet based on HP damage. Most Line attacks can tinue for their length even if obstructed by a barrier. So theoretically, if you could get a line attack long enough to reach the core of the planet (or punch out the other side for that matter), wouldn't it then just have to do enough damage to destroy the 5ft or 10ft subsections of the planet in a straight shot. I wonder what affect it would have on a planet to have its core suddenly exposed?

Firstly, in the event that you got this to work, two things would try to happen: the immense presure the rock mantle is exerting on the magma core would force the magma to go up the newly-opened path, like a syringe pushing liquid through a thin needle. However, as seen here in a larger example (https://what-if.xkcd.com/46/), the same forces making the magma rise to the surface would cause the hole to collapse. Both of these things are happening simultaneously, and due to the massive amounts of gravitational force that's in play here, so it becomes a question of whether the hole is closing faster than the magma is rising; if the magma reaches the surface before the hole collapses, then you have a volcanic eruption.

Secondly most AoE spells have a damage cap and/or a range cap that makes creating a hole the the Earth's Core difficult; however, if we can find one with both line length and damage based on CL (even if they're capped), we can Use Reserves of Strength+Greater Consumptive Field+wasp swarm to blow those caps away and drill a hole through the Earth. Incidentally, I'm off to find just such a spell.

EDIT: Okay, so it's not a line effect, but here's what I've found: assuming the RoS+GCF+swarm trick for infinite CL, you can cast a single Sphere of Ultimate Destruction spell that can fly up to 30 ft and destroy a 10 ft cube with every move; if you find a way to get three move actions per round while still remaining within range of the sphere and unkillable by magma (you have 9th level spells and you're trying to destroy the world, figure something out), you can have the sphere drill a 10 by 10 hole down to the Core; since it's necessary, use Permanent Walls of Force to brace the hole open and keep it from collapsing due to pressure (this may requires a lot of Force Walls,and will require nested Thought Bottles to avoid completely draining your XP reserves); with your ridiculous CL, each casting of Wall of Force should get you ~10000 panels of the stuff, which becomes ~2000 ft of hole braced on all four sides with horizontal blockers every 10 ft (assuming you use a snaking wall formation, but will take up 2 level 5 spells; since you need over 8000 of these casting cycles to reach the planet core, you'll probably need to rest at some point, but those walls aren't going anywhere, so you may as well sleep on them. Probably best to dismiss the sphere in your sleep, though. However many cycles it takes you, you'll eventually reach the Core; at this point, you Greater Teleport back to the surface and do it again in a catty-corner 10 by 10 square. Repeat until you have five Permanent Wall of Force braced shafts going straight down to the Earth's Core.that surround a 10 by 10 column of earth. It should look something like this:



Earth
Earth
Earth
Earth
Earth


Earth
Earth
WoF Shaft
Earth
Earth


Earth
WoF Shaft
WoF Shaft
WoF Shaft
Earth


Earth
Earth
WoF Shaft
Earth
Earth


Earth
Earth
Earth
Earth
Earth




Now, starting with the WoF spells closest to the planet core that aren't holding the hole open; dismiss the spells. Wait for the magma (or whatever it is) to rise the ~2000 feet it just gained, then do so with the next closest WoF spells. Repeat until all WoF layers are gone, and there's a roughly circular column of magma 30 ft in diameter rising from the core . Cackle maniacally as your ~10 years of work pays off in the form of a continuous 30 ft diameter hole leading to the planet core, held wide open by several thousand CL ~10000 Permanent Walls of Force that's pumping out magma onto the surface.

Do it with my Khepri build; her billion googol swarms can each cast a Twin'd Repeat'd Sphere of Ultimate Destrction that has a range of 10 billion googol ft, each swarm using enough castings of the Celerity spell line to move their spheres up to 30 ft per round. Within a few hours at most, everything within that range (10 billion googol ft) should be consumed by the 4 billion googol SoUD the swarm is controlling. Of course, Khepri's okay, because infinite HP and infinite saves means she can just stand in the center of all of this and not feel a thing.

[Tvtyrant]

Firstly, in the event that you got this to work, two things would try to happen: the immense presure the rock mantle is exerting on the magma core would force the magma to go up the newly-opened path, like a syringe pushing liquid through a thin needle. However, as seen here in a larger example (https://what-if.xkcd.com/46/), the same forces making the magma rise to the surface would cause the hole to collapse. Both of these things are happening simultaneously, and due to the massive amounts of gravitational force that's in play here, so it becomes a question of whether the hole is closing faster than the magma is rising; if the magma reaches the surface before the hole collapses, then you have a volcanic eruption.

Secondly most AoE spells have a damage cap and/or a range cap that makes creating a hole the the Earth's Core difficult; however, if we can find one with both line length and damage based on CL (even if they're capped), we can Use Reserves of Strength+Greater Consumptive Field+wasp swarm to blow those caps away and drill a hole through the Earth. Incidentally, I'm off to find just such a spell.

Aganazzar’s scorcher is the one we want I think. It's range is CL based without a cap, damage is CL based, and it is a second level spell. It combos with Reserves of Strength and Greater Consumptive Field to kill the world.

[AvatarVecna]

Aganazzar’s scorcher is the one we want I think. It's range is CL based without a cap, damage is CL based, and it is a second level spell. It combos with Reserves of Strength and Greater Consumptive Field to kill the world.

Even with Enlarge spell, you'd need a CL of ~9 million; even RoS and GCF can't quite get that, at least not so quickly. Khepri gets that kind of CL in three chain-gate cycles, though...

Still, I prefer my method; it's slow, but it's classy.

[ExLibrisMortis]

Pyroclastic dragons have a line of disintegrate as breath weapon. Using appropriate shenanigans, you could turn that into an emanation and repeat metabreath feats to reduce the whole planet to a pile of ashes.

In this case, you only need four feats: Enlarge Breath, Shape Breath, Spreading Breath and Extend Spreading Breath. A colossal dragon with the latter three feats get a 35' spread at 140' range, which is increased by 50% each time you apply Enlarge Breath. As usual, this dragon won't ever use a breath weapon again etc. etc., but for a dragon about to die anyway, who cares?

[Renen]

Why not just use the epic spell to animate the planet? It'll only take a year of prep time

[Auron3991]

D2 Crusader doesn't care, planet goes away with one punch.

[Troacctid]

D2 Crusader doesn't care, planet goes away with one punch.

Correction, one section of the planet goes away with one punch. Only millions more punches to go.

[heavyfuel]

Could you Iron Heart Surge the planet away? Gravity's an effect lasting more than 1 round, and if you cancel that out, gravity no longer affecting the Earth, would it then allow each of the Earth's constituent pieces to head off in the myriad of directions they were travelling in consistent with Newton's First Law?


No. Gravity is not an effect or condition, and it has no duration.


Indeed. Lest we forget, IHS can only extiguish sunlight if you're a Drow (or any other race with Light Blindness or some such).

Now we only need to find a way to have a condition caused by gravity (explicitly called as such in the Rules) and it can be ended. :smallamused:

[Troacctid]

Indeed. Lest we forget, IHS can only extiguish sunlight if you're a Drow (or any other race with Light Blindness or some such).

Now we only need to find a way to have a condition caused by gravity (explicitly called as such in the Rules) and it can be ended. :smallamused:

False. Iron Heart Surge only ends the light blindness effect. It doesn't eliminate the cause or source of the effect. I dunno why you'd think it would, either--there's nothing in the text to suggest that.

[AvatarVecna]

Your fighting spirit, dedication, and training allow you to overcome almost anything to defeat your enemies. When you use this maneuver, select one spell, effect, or other condition currently affecting you and with a duration of 1 or more rounds. That effect ends immediately. You also surge with confidence and vengeance against your enemies, gaining a +2 morale bonus on attack rolls until the end of your next turn.

The bolded part establishes what can be selected; the underlined part establishes what happened to the spell/effect/condition you selected. "Spells" are well-defined by RAW, as are "Conditions", so there's no ambiguity on whether or not IHS affects such things. However, "Effect" is a very broad term that isn't defined by RAW; presumably, it could be inferred to be anything affecting you that isn't a spell or condition, but that's ridiculously vague. Unfortunately, due to the vagueness of what exactly counts as an "effect", many people have decided to insist that this means they can IHS away the source of anything currently bothering them, including the Sun (for being too bright) or apparently gravity (for trying to bring them down).

That said, because "Effect" is not defined by RAW, there is nothing by RAW that can count as an "effect"; in RAI, a DM could decide that some non-spell non-condition qualified as an "effect", and could therefore be IHS'd away...but by the same token, if something wasn't a spell or condition by RAW, it would require DM approval to IHS away, and let it suffice to say that it's very unlikely your DM will decide that a 3rd level maneuver can and should be capable of wiping the sun from existence.

This is a silly thing people; it depends on your interpretation of the rules having more mechanical authority than both RAW and common sense at the same time, which is cow poo. Now let's get back to the more SRS BSNS that destroying a hypothetical world with imaginary finger wiggling and screwy Latinese entails.

[Troacctid]

That said, because "Effect" is not defined by RAW, there is nothing by RAW that can count as an "effect"; in RAI, a DM could decide that some non-spell non-condition qualified as an "effect", and could therefore be IHS'd away...

...but it would still need to be within the maneuver's range to be affected by it, so even if your DM for some reason were willing to go against the text and rule that the maneuver can affect objects and creatures as well as effects, you could only "end" yourself with it, because Iron Heart Surge is Range: Personal, Target: You.

I guess maybe if you could somehow Awaken the entire planet and get it to take Warblade levels, weird things might be able to happen, maybe? But that seems pretty sketchy.

[Renen]

Well not somehow... You need epic spells, but you totally can :D

[Troacctid]

Is there an epic spell that awakens the planet? Because that would neatly solve the issue of having to damage it in sections.

[Renen]

No, but you can make one. The DC is godlike, but you can just have a bunch of permanently summoned solars contribute spell slots. One of the long time members of the forum did a write up on this a while back.

[heavyfuel]

@IHS: It was just a joke guys. The maneuver is so poorly written that it may be interpreted in a thousand different ways.


Is there an epic spell that awakens the planet? Because that would neatly solve the issue of having to damage it in sections.

I remember Tippy playing a psionic sandwich at one point, only instead of a sandwich, it was a whole planet. If someone can dig that out, I'm pretty sure we may be able to destroy the planet pre-epic (assuming we can deal with a high level psion played in tippy levels of OP)

[Rubik]

Next, I'm going to try to calculate an epic spell that could destroy such an object.

Energy Seed Psionic Power (cuz psionics is cool).
I'm definitely overestimating if damage is dealt to each part of the object, but let's go for it anyways.
DC 19 Base
Hide visual display = +4
Change area to 4 10 foot cubes = +2
Quickened = +28
Range improvement to 1,000,000 miles = +35200000
Sonic Damage Type = +0
Improve damage to 150000000000000000000000020d6 = +300000000000000000000000020
Improve area to 10000 mile cubes from 10 foot cubes = +21120000
Increase Spell Penetration by 1000000 = +2000000
Increase Resist by 1000000 = +2000000

Total DC 300,000,000,000,000,000,062,320,073

A bit over 300 septillion. I just love back of the envelope calculations.Rockburst is a level 2 druid spell that can do that.

[Troacctid]

@IHS: It was just a joke guys. The maneuver is so poorly written that it may be interpreted in a thousand different ways.
Well it's an Outside Joke (http://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Laconic/OutsideJoke), then.


(assuming we can deal with a high level psion played in tippy levels of OP)

We're talking about blowing up planets here. If that's in bounds, I think psionic sandwiches are okay. :smalltongue:

Do you happen to have a link or something? I know it wouldn't work with the usual psionic sandwich trick, since that involves polymorphing the object, and the usual methods for doing that wouldn't work on a whole planet.


Rockburst is a level 2 druid spell that can do that.
Not quite--even if you allow that the whole planet counts as one object (which is unlikely for the Earth but might be true for other planets), you're still limited by the spell's range and area.

[Renen]

*TVtropes link*

http://i21.photobucket.com/albums/b293/UkrainianRocket/Noooooo.jpg

https://devcentral.f5.com/weblogs/images/devcentral_f5_com/weblogs/macvittie/WindowsLiveWriter/ItsaTrap_10391/ackbar_2.jpg

[Rubik]

Not quite--even if you allow that the whole planet counts as one object (which is unlikely for the Earth but might be true for other planets), you're still limited by the spell's range and area.Yep! And so long as part of the Earth is within range, it will explode in its entirety, though it only deals damage within the range of the spell.

[Auron3991]

Correction, one section of the planet goes away with one punch. Only millions more punches to go.

I haven't yet seen a rule declaring that planet sized objects can't count as one object. Remember, Elder Evils can be defeated with a single blow, and included in those are absolutely massive creatures like the Worm that Walks and Ragnorra. Plus, one could by the rules sunder colossal sized weapons (once again, bigger than the stated sections in a wall of iron). Not to mention the fact that most things created by a "Wall of" spell would end up with excess energy not actually transferring to the wall because the section of wall would give into open space. Basically, it's like a boulder hitting a wall of paper. The boulder may be able to knock down a stone tower, but it will still only rip through the paper wall.

[Troacctid]

Here's the rule.


Very large objects have separate hit point totals for different sections. For example, you can attack and ruin a wagon wheel without destroying the whole wagon.

Most planets are considered very large. Larger than most wagons, I'd wager. :smallwink:

[AvatarVecna]

Most planets are considered very large. Larger than most wagons, I'd wager. :smallwink:

Wagons are constructed of multiple parts; planets are not. Ergo, by RAW, the planet is a single object, not a collection of multiple objects connected to form a larger, more complex object, and it is therefore treated as a single object for the purposes of destroying it.

Wait, I'm sorry, I seem to have accidentally left my stupid level in the upright position temporarily. That doesn't work at all.

[ben-zayb]

It has many section, but is it still counted as one object? Because assuming the weight of the earth is ~1.4x1025, a fully augmented ML152 Time Hop or Mass Time Hop is capable of making an object weighing 300x276 (~2.3x1025) hop forward in time.

So if the purpose was to just kill all earth-dependent creatures living under it, stalling earth for ~152 rounds or hours seems to do the job

[Troacctid]

I doubt it counts as a single object. The Earth is composed of many different objects. I mean, is a door an object separate from the house? Is the house separate from the rock foundation it's built on? Is the foundation separate from the dirt on top of it? What about the pool in the backyard, is it separate from that? I think the generally accepted ruling is that they're different objects; to say otherwise would be to say that you can't Time Hop a door without Time Hopping the entire dungeon, or a boulder without the entire mountain.

Also, don't two doublings make a tripling and two triplings make a quadrupling and so on, or am I misremembering that rule? I don't have the text handy.

[Rubik]

Wagons are constructed of multiple parts; planets are not. Ergo, by RAW, the planet is a single object, not a collection of multiple objects connected to form a larger, more complex object, and it is therefore treated as a single object for the purposes of destroying it.

Wait, I'm sorry, I seem to have accidentally left my stupid level in the upright position temporarily. That doesn't work at all.For hp, sure, but it's still a single object as far as spell effects are concerned. Otherwise you couldn't enhance a Colossal-sized sword or protect a wall using a lyre of building.


Also, don't two doublings make a tripling and two triplings make a quadrupling and so on, or am I misremembering that rule? I don't have the text handy.For some things, yes, but real world measurements explicitly don't ascribe to the "two doublings make a tripling" rule, such as distance and weight.

[hamishspence]

The Star Munchkin D20 game had a few extra size categories:


Asteroid, typical (Colossal: Size Modifier -8)
Asteroid, dino-killer (Ludicrous: Size Modifier -16)
Moon (Stupefying: Size Modifier -32)
Earth (Astounding: Size Modifier -64)
Jupiter (Excessive: Size Modifier -128)
Star (Vast: Size Modifier -256)
Dyson sphere (Inconceivable: Size Modifier -512)


Earth-sized objects had surprisingly low hp (65536 Hit Dice (d10) : 360,768 hp)

[kstout6]

I haven't yet seen a rule declaring that planet sized objects can't count as one object. Remember, Elder Evils can be defeated with a single blow, and included in those are absolutely massive creatures like the Worm that Walks and Ragnorra. Plus, one could by the rules sunder colossal sized weapons (once again, bigger than the stated sections in a wall of iron). Not to mention the fact that most things created by a "Wall of" spell would end up with excess energy not actually transferring to the wall because the section of wall would give into open space. Basically, it's like a boulder hitting a wall of paper. The boulder may be able to knock down a stone tower, but it will still only rip through the paper wall.


The Earth's statistics are as followed:

Hardness: 6 (crust), Mantle 12, Core, 144
AC: 0 (if you are standing or adjacent to it)
HP: 864,184,168,000,000,000,000 or 8.64184168 x 10^20.
The earth is made up of different types of elements, and as you go into the earth, the further you go in, the denser and more hit points the layers has due to gravity. This is to include all the zones together.

[Deophaun]

Earth has 256 HP if you cast animate object on it first.

[Coretron03]

Wagons are constructed of multiple parts; planets are not. Ergo, by RAW, the planet is a single object, not a collection of multiple objects connected to form a larger, more complex object, and it is therefore treated as a single object for the purposes of destroying it.

Wait, I'm sorry, I seem to have accidentally left my stupid level in the upright position temporarily. That doesn't work at all.

It think that would be funnier if it was in Dark Orchid :smallbiggrin:.

[rferries]

Earth has 256 HP if you cast animate object on it first.

Ha! RAW at its worst. :D

[noob]

There is a necromancer swarm around this dead thread.
Can I join the party and animate more dead?