Shape stone question

[SangoProduction]

So....how far away from the stone you are shaping can you be, if you touch the ground? Is there a minimum depth which you have to affect (so no 0.000001 ft depth until you reach the target)? Can you not use it to try and trap people, with like claws of earth, or straight up caging them (I'd personally give that a reflex save)?

[Khedrac]

Two things to remember for Stone Shape:

1. It only affects a single piece of stone
2. It only affects a stone up to quite a small size limit.

So to use it on the ground your opponent is standing on, not only do you have to touch the stone, but the stone must be small enough to affect.
If you are walking on natural rock that isn't multiple bits, it is unlikely to be small enough to be a valid target for the spell.
However should someone have formed a single stone floor that is only an inch or two deep then you might be able to use it to trap your opponent - and I think the suggestion of a reflex saving throw is appropriate.
In a typical stone flagged corridor you will need to be right next to your opponent (possibly reaching into their square) to touch the stone targeted.

[Diarmuid]

@Khedrac - I think you've misread the spell a little.



Target: Stone or stone object touched, up to 10 cu. ft. + 1 cu. ft./level


I read that as you can effect "stone" of up to 10 cu ft + (1 cu ft/lvl). If you're working on a huge stone wall, that's the size of the portion you can effect. The spell mentions making "doors", and in most cases you would be casting on a large wall or something to make a door through.

There's probably a grammatical way to read it to support the way you presented it, but that's not how any group I've ever played works.

To the OP - I've never thought to try and use it to trap an enemy, but the amount of stone you're actually able to impact isnt all that much. Consider a 5th level cleric, he/she can effect 15 cubic feet of stone. If you were trying to make a 1' thick stone block to put around an enemy, you'd need 98 cubic feet of stone and would need a CL of 88. This would have an approximate break DC of 17 (extrapolated from 3 feet of hewn stone having a break DC of 50). Trying to figure out how much stone a "claw" or some other trapping design would utilize was always too much effort for the math minded people in my groups, so we pretty much only ever used it for utility of going through walls or making crude tools/etc.

I respect your ingenuity, and there's nothing saying you couldnt do what you're trying to do. Many DM's would likely hand-wave the math involved in figuring out how much stone you have to work with and just assign negatives/penalties/etc as they saw fit depending on how you described it. This will work better with some DM's than others as it's very subjective.

EDIT - Fixed math error