I think I may have made a mistake with a Conjuration Wizard

[Shining Wrath]

Specifically, I let him conjure a 5 pound block of pure sodium. Next to a pot of water, on a trap that was rising into the ceiling after attempting to squash the party.

Result: VERY disabled trap. Ain't gonna trap no more. That's not the problem, they had figured out how to disable it anyway (put a weight on the pressure plate so it can't rise back up and reset). The wizard was just having fun and I gave him an Inspiration point for role-playing his nerd wizard.

The problem is that I've let chemistry into my campaign, with a table full of people who know what the lanthanide series is.

Any suggestions?

[Sigreid]

Specifically, I let him conjure a 5 pound block of pure sodium. Next to a pot of water, on a trap that was rising into the ceiling after attempting to squash the party.

Result: VERY disabled trap. Ain't gonna trap no more. That's not the problem, they had figured out how to disable it anyway (put a weight on the pressure plate so it can't rise back up and reset). The wizard was just having fun and I gave him an Inspiration point for role-playing his nerd wizard.

The problem is that I've let chemistry into my campaign, with a table full of people who know what the lanthanide series is.

Any suggestions?

Tell the players that it's a mid evil world and you aren't going to let them use modern understanding of physics and chemistry in the future. That his was a one off you allowed for fun because it didn't matter.

[MrStabby]

Lanthanides? What are they!!1! Everyone knows there are only 4 elements!

[Fwiffo86]

Specifically, I let him conjure a 5 pound block of pure sodium. Next to a pot of water, on a trap that was rising into the ceiling after attempting to squash the party.

Result: VERY disabled trap. Ain't gonna trap no more. That's not the problem, they had figured out how to disable it anyway (put a weight on the pressure plate so it can't rise back up and reset). The wizard was just having fun and I gave him an Inspiration point for role-playing his nerd wizard.

The problem is that I've let chemistry into my campaign, with a table full of people who know what the lanthanide series is.

Any suggestions?

Tell your chemistry class that if they can transmute lead into gold themselves irl, you will allow all the chemistry they need and/or want in the game?

[MrStabby]

Tell your chemistry class that if they can transmute lead into gold themselves irl, you will allow all the chemistry they need and/or want in the game?

Gotta get me a neutron source...

[Shining Wrath]

Gotta get me a neutron source...

The legendary Californium dragon!

[Sigreid]

Tell your chemistry class that if they can transmute lead into gold themselves irl, you will allow all the chemistry they need and/or want in the game?

Conjuration and transmutation wizards would be great in a sci fi game. Rapid prototype anything in short order.

[Ninja_Prawn]

Yep, you've got to keep real-world physics and chemistry out of D&D. It just breaks everything.

Maybe you can recover this by saying that real science only works if it's something a 13-year-old would know? That's about when you start learning things like 'sodium reacts aggressively with water'.

[dropbear8mybaby]

In my games I make it clear that the physics of the world are substantially different from those of the real world. That's why alchemy and magic work.

[Millface]

Personally I allow them to come up with whatever crazy stuff they want in that regard, it doesn't break my game. I don't see how it could. As far as I know almost all the transmuter stuff has the stipulation that values between transmuted materials must remain equal anyway.

If anything I would rather say that Mystra (or whoever your god/ess of magic is) disallows the spell being used that way, not that physics don't work here or that these ungodly intelligent minds haven't figured most of it out. These are a people who could easily build trains/cars/guns but the minds that can are typically Wizards so whats the point?

I don't see this world as lacking in technology because they don't have the understanding, I see it more as that they don't have the need.

[Shining Wrath]

I think I'm going to go with the Roger Rabbit rule on this.




Eddie Valiant: You mean you could've taken your hand out of that cuff at any time?

Roger Rabbit: No, not at any time, only when it was funny.

[Naanomi]

I tend to go with medieval alchemy, with most common chemical reactions exist but the underlying reason is way different... The intense negative energy charge of sodium reacts violently with the slight positive energy charge found in most elemental water; acid is safely held in glass because the purified charge-neural earth doesn't react to the unstable water/earth molecule of the acid...

Plenty of ground for alchemists and clever players to be creative, plenty of leeway for me to say 'no, your real life high-school chemistry knowledge doesn't trump setting elements or narrative flow'

[Vogonjeltz]

Specifically, I let him conjure a 5 pound block of pure sodium. Next to a pot of water, on a trap that was rising into the ceiling after attempting to squash the party.

Result: VERY disabled trap. Ain't gonna trap no more. That's not the problem, they had figured out how to disable it anyway (put a weight on the pressure plate so it can't rise back up and reset). The wizard was just having fun and I gave him an Inspiration point for role-playing his nerd wizard.

The problem is that I've let chemistry into my campaign, with a table full of people who know what the lanthanide series is.

Any suggestions?

I forget the exact page number, but this is where the text on reminding players to avoid using metagame information comes into play.

Specifically, remind them of the Player/Character membrane that exists which keeps player knowledge and character knowledge separate. Just because your player has a PhD in Chemistry or the like does not mean that their character does too.

If you determine that your world is not scientifically advanced, don't let the players do things that require advanced science knowledge. Pure sodium was first isolated by Sir Humphrey Davy in 1807 through the electrolysis of caustic soda (NaOH).

Basically nobody in your (presumably medieval) world is going to have the first clue about this kind of thing.

So, gently remind them to have their characters do only things that the character would do.

[pibby]

Assuming you're no chemist yourself and you're not running a sandbox game, I would say the best solution would be to meet in the middle with your table.

Say that they can only use chemistry as an ability check that can accomplish goals that can be otherwise be achieved by other ability checks. Like they can use gunpowder to break down a door when alternatively it can be done with a strength check. The check for the gunpowder in this case could be a new ability check that would work for your table, an Intelligence (alchemy) check.

This lets them be creative but not to the point that such great creativity can break a campaign.

[dropbear8mybaby]

I think it can be more fun to have alternate physics and chemistry in a setting. Read through some old alchemy philosophies and create mystical and magical recipes that your players can find and experiment with. Imagine finding out that sulphur, magnesium & the tail of a goat feather (don't ask) could combine to create an explosive mixture that sent everyone flying upwards 100-feet before wearing off...

[Nifft]

1/ Complement the player for the creative idea. Do this in front of the whole table.

2/ Ask the whole table if they want modern chemistry to be available in the campaign in general. Ask them if they want to fight Elemental Evil Plutonium Golems, for example, or a Lich who researched Melf's FOOF Arrow.

3/ If they want modern chemistry in the game, then it's entirely legitimate to kill them using science.

4/ "The dragon exhales a cloud of..." and pick something from here: http://pipeline.corante.com/archives/things_i_wont_work_with/

[Drackolus]

You could just make the argument that while basic chemistry is the same, the similarities end there - to the point the world isn't even actually made up of atoms and molecules. The rest won't work, since it's making these assumptions. If they ask you how it all works, tell them you don't know, you're not a arcanophysicist.

[Shining Wrath]

I went with this ruling:


I don’t think I want chemistry in D&D. If sodium + water = fire works, so does vinegar + bleach = chlorine, and the odds that there are deposits of sodium nitrate around are pretty good.

Therefore, going forward, we have 4 elements: air, earth, fire, water. And sodium (and iron, and gold), are aspects of earth. Chemistry will henceforth be subject to the Valiant – Rabbit rule:

Eddie Valiant: You mean you could’ve taken your hand out of that cuff at any time?
Roger Rabbit: No, not at any time, only when it was funny.

[Millface]

1/ Complement the player for the creative idea. Do this in front of the whole table.

2/ Ask the whole table if they want modern chemistry to be available in the campaign in general. Ask them if they want to fight Elemental Evil Plutonium Golems, for example, or a Lich who researched Melf's FOOF Arrow.

3/ If they want modern chemistry in the game, then it's entirely legitimate to kill them using science.

4/ "The dragon exhales a cloud of..." and pick something from here: http://pipeline.corante.com/archives/things_i_wont_work_with/

Periodic Elements and Magical Elements are not the same. Fire, Water, Earth, and Air are each made up of several chemistry elements. Element is defined as a part or aspect of something abstract.

So it stands to reason that you can't conjure a Plutonium Elemental but you can Conjure a Fire Elemental. Conjuring an elemental reaches into the Elemental Planes, where there is no Plutonium, or at the very least where there is plutonium but you don't control what kinds of earth you're summoning up, maybe there ARE traces of plutonium in most Earth Elementals, but it's not likely to get one made entirely of that element.. You could, however, with great understanding transmute something into plutonium.

It's a fine line, but it makes sense based on the definition of what an Element is.

[Nifft]

I went with this ruling:
That's very sensible.

Creative players are fun.

May your gaming remain awesome.



Periodic Elements and Magical Elements are not the same. Fire, Water, Earth, and Air are each made up of several chemistry elements. Element is defined as a part or aspect of something abstract.

So it stands to reason that you can't conjure a Plutonium Elemental but
I was not talking about any sort of Plutonium Elemental.

Here's what I said, for reference:

Ask them if they want to fight Elemental Evil Plutonium Golems, for example, or a Lich who researched Melf's FOOF Arrow.
(emphasis added)

If you wish to exercise pedantry upon my posts, I'm going to have to ask you to read all the words in my posts.

Cheers!

[Naanomi]

I like using elemental alchemy as the basis for the world, gold is a molecule of mostly earth but some fire with a strong positive energy spin; transmuting lead to gold is the process of removing highly negative earth atoms by replacing them with positive fire atoms....

Planescape used this model here and there, it serves as a good basis to keep alchemy 'scientific' while keeping real chemistry far away

[Yagyujubei]

let em do whatever they want, but make it clear that result wont necessarily be what they would expect according to real world physics or logic.