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Fiery Justice
2007-11-12, 05:21 PM
Okay, supposing that you are a very cruel and evil person and you decide you want to commit genocide, but you have a charisma of three. You set out to hunt down and kill all members of a particular species (lets say, Goblins or Humans, for the sake of simplicity), you are level 20, and are unwilling to blow up the planet (no antimatter bombs nerds.), can you do it, barring divine intervention?

Mr.Bookworm
2007-11-12, 05:22 PM
Level 20 Wizard?

I can't count the numbers of ways he could commit genocide.

AKA_Bait
2007-11-12, 05:22 PM
Become a Lich. Take your time with it.

AslanCross
2007-11-12, 05:39 PM
This is one of the many ways an arcane caster could do it:


I saw this trick on the D&D CharOps boards once, and repost it every time someone asks about destroying the world.

1. Take the Locate City spell (from Cityscape, I believe) and apply Snowcasting (FB) to it. This gives it the [cold] descriptor.
2. Now that it is [cold], apply Flash Frost (FB). This makes it do 2 cold damage to everything in the area, which is ten miles per CL.
3. Apply Energy Substitution (Comp.Arc). This turns the cold damage into electricity.
4. Now that it does elecricity damage, it is a valid target for Born of the Three Thunders (PHBII). This makes it do half electricity and half sonic damage, but more importantly, it also allows a Reflex save for half damage, which allows you to...
5. ...apply Explosive Spell (Comp.Arc) to this mess. This makes anyone who fails an additional save be pushed back to the edge of the radius and take 1d6 per ten feet travelled.

*deep breath*

End Result: Snowcasting Flash Frost Energy Substitution (Electricity) Born of the Three Thunders Explosive Locate City. With all the metamagic, this is a 4th level spell (assume level 7). When you cast this, anyone within seventy miles must make a Reflex save or be blown back to the extreme of the area and take 1d6 per ten feet travelled. They are travelling seventy miles.

Congratulations, you are now dealing (5280 / 10 x 70) 36,960d6 at level seven, with an additional 5,280d6 per level, to everyone and everything within seventy miles. That's an average of 129,360 damage (untyped, too).

Best of all, since this spell is only fourth level, you can make wands of it. Hand them out to your fanatical cultist followers, space them out in stratagetic locations and major cities, and let lose.

Of course, this probably isn't guaranteed as there may be some terrain that will prevent your victims from flying 70 miles.

Guildorn Tanaleth
2007-11-12, 05:44 PM
You can do it at any level, if you can find a scroll of genocide. Just make sure to BUC test it with your pet first, unless you're willing to risk being surrounded. Of course, once you read it, you break the illiteracy conduct, and-- Oh, wait, you meant real D&D, not NetHack? Nevermind, then.

Aquillion
2007-11-12, 05:44 PM
The Locate City Bomb also fails to kill people who make their saves. And we don't just want to do a lot of damage -- we want to kill every member of the race, everywhere. That means finding them.

Do we want to genocide them in every plane, or just the Prime Material Plane? That's a pretty important question. If we're talking about every plane, it's probably not doable, since you'd even have to eliminate them in places like the Abyss or Sigil, where there are even more powerful opponents who will get in your way.

Really... although most of the time it's a bad idea to introduce "wouldn't the gods..." to a theoretical question like this (since it comes down to DM fiat), in this case there's no avoiding the fact that for most races you're going to have to deal with their racial deity at the very least.

My advice? Put it off a bit and gain one more level to get Epic casting. At that point genocide is small change.

Miles Invictus
2007-11-12, 05:45 PM
Disease is the way to go. Either something that causes irreversible sterility or infertility, or something that kills off all males or females.

It should infect through contact and have a long incubation period, so no one tracks it back to the source. A year or longer might be reasonable. Insert it into the water system. Make sure that known aphrodisiacs get an extra helping of disease-ridden water.

MCerberus
2007-11-12, 05:46 PM
This is one of the many ways an arcane caster could do it:



Of course, this probably isn't guaranteed as there may be some terrain that will prevent your victims from flying 70 miles.

At the risk of mutilating a catgirl, if they're being blown 70 miles and hit something on the way there, it isn't going to feel like a pillow fight.


And that's some great metamagic abuse right there.

AKA_Bait
2007-11-12, 05:50 PM
Make sure that known aphrodisiacs get an extra helping of disease-ridden water.

Do you mean Nymphomaniacs?

mostlyharmful
2007-11-12, 05:50 PM
There was a spell in the BoVD that ate an artifact and did huge ability damage to the caster to do shedloads of damage to everything within 10miles per caster level, it took 24 hours to cast though. If you're looking to wipe out a kingdom or small continent then that'd be the way to go.

TRM
2007-11-12, 05:51 PM
The Locate City Bomb also fails to kill people who make their saves. And we don't just want to do a lot of damage -- we want to kill every member of the race, everywhere. That means finding them.
I'm not sure what Locate City does, but is there anything stopping you from creating hundreds and hundreds of wands of Locate City bombs and using them on any and all cities in the world over and over until you reach and destroy everyone of a particular race? (I guess this has the problem that it would just kill everything in the world...:smallfrown:)

MrNexx
2007-11-12, 05:52 PM
This is one of the many ways an arcane caster could do it:



Of course, this probably isn't guaranteed as there may be some terrain that will prevent your victims from flying 70 miles.

I saw a discussion of this of this, actually, that said there was a problem with it... namely, once you use Energy Substitution, Snowcasting doesn't add damage, so you lose that. You need to use Energy Admixture in order to make it work, so it is both Cold and Lightning or Sonic.

Funkyodor
2007-11-12, 05:58 PM
There's always the carefully worded wish spell and lienent DM option using the "You may try to use a wish to produce greater effects than these, but doing so is dangerous. (The wish may pervert your intent into a literal but undesirable fulfillment or only a partial fulfillment.)" clause. But other than that waiting till 21 and making a Genocide spell would be the better route.

Mewtarthio
2007-11-12, 06:00 PM
I saw a discussion of this of this, actually, that said there was a problem with it... namely, once you use Energy Substitution, Snowcasting doesn't add damage, so you lose that. You need to use Energy Admixture in order to make it work, so it is both Cold and Lightning or Sonic.

The question then becomes whether or not metamagic is like a template (You can have, for instance, a vampire werewolf, even though vampires can't become werewolves, so long as you apply the werewolf template first).

Catch
2007-11-12, 06:00 PM
Well, there's always the Greater Consumptive Field trick.

1. Be a Cleric.
2. Get to level 23.
3. Take Permanent Emanation (Greater Consumptive Field)
4. Go on a leisurely stroll. Anything near you with less than 9 HP instantly dies and you gain 1d8 temporary HP and an untyped +2 bonus to Strength. Rats, bugs and Commoners all drop like flies.

Furthermore, the spell is a permanent effect, so the extra hit points and strength never go away. With all the extra HP, you can make something fancy, say an Epic spell that murderizes everyone. Or just start punching people with your infinite Strength. Either way, you've broken the game.

Riffington
2007-11-12, 06:19 PM
Supreme Cleave.:smallwink:

TauKid
2007-11-12, 06:31 PM
I know it's supposed to be in the sticky thread but I couldn't find FB in there, so what's FB (cause I want to look this nuke of a spell up)?

tyckspoon
2007-11-12, 06:36 PM
Frostburn (fillerfillerfillerpost)

Stormcrow
2007-11-12, 06:47 PM
Take a sword. Hit people till there are none left.

MCerberus
2007-11-12, 06:52 PM
You're going to have to get around Race Deities no matter what you do. Get a spell that kills every Dwarf and Moradin pops them back into existence and decides you should go through a portal leading to the very bottom of the sea in the plane of fire and drains your (relevant spell casting ability) to 10.

horseboy
2007-11-12, 07:20 PM
There's always the carefully worded wish spell and lienent DM option using the "You may try to use a wish to produce greater effects than these, but doing so is dangerous. (The wish may pervert your intent into a literal but undesirable fulfillment or only a partial fulfillment.)" clause. But other than that waiting till 21 and making a Genocide spell would be the better route.
I know a guy that did the wish. He was a not too bright dwarven fighter who wished to be "the greatest dwarf ever!" Boomf! All the other dwarves in the world disappeared.

Lord Tataraus
2007-11-12, 08:21 PM
You're going to have to get around Race Deities no matter what you do. Get a spell that kills every Dwarf and Moradin pops them back into existence and decides you should go through a portal leading to the very bottom of the sea in the plane of fire and drains your (relevant spell casting ability) to 10.

It depends are your reading of the source of a deity's power. From what I understand, a deity's power is a direct porportional to the number of followers so if all the dwarves are gone, Moradin poofs out of existence.

Tyrael
2007-11-12, 08:48 PM
This is one of the many ways an arcane caster could do it:



Of course, this probably isn't guaranteed as there may be some terrain that will prevent your victims from flying 70 miles.



Ummmm.

According to the Wizards spell list, there's no such thing as Locate City.

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/lists/spells

Lord Tataraus
2007-11-12, 08:53 PM
Ummmm.

According to the Wizards spell list, there's no such thing as Locate City.

http://www.wizards.com/default.asp?x=dnd/lists/spells

Uh, you realize that the list is completely Spell Compendium and Players Handbook? Unless I missed something and it does actually contain other spells, then it most likely does not contain Cityscape because I have the book and have read that spell.

Ponce
2007-11-12, 09:43 PM
Well, there's always the Greater Consumptive Field trick.

1. Be a Cleric.
2. Get to level 23.
3. Take Permanent Emanation (Greater Consumptive Field)
4. Go on a leisurely stroll. Anything near you with less than 9 HP instantly dies and you gain 1d8 temporary HP and an untyped +2 bonus to Strength. Rats, bugs and Commoners all drop like flies.

Furthermore, the spell is a permanent effect, so the extra hit points and strength never go away. With all the extra HP, you can make something fancy, say an Epic spell that murderizes everyone. Or just start punching people with your infinite Strength. Either way, you've broken the game.

Persistent spell and divine metamagic lets you do it much earlier.

Swordguy
2007-11-12, 09:49 PM
Use this. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=2010735#post2010735)

I guarantee you'll get your targets. Along with everything/one else you might someday wanna kill.

Naihal
2007-11-12, 09:58 PM
Use this. (http://www.giantitp.com/forums/showthread.php?p=2010735#post2010735)

I guarantee you'll get your targets. Along with everything/one else you might someday wanna kill.


Okay, supposing that you are a very cruel and evil person and you decide you want to commit genocide, but you have a charisma of three. You set out to hunt down and kill all members of a particular species (lets say, Goblins or Humans, for the sake of simplicity), you are level 20, and are unwilling to blow up the planet (no antimatter bombs nerds.), can you do it, barring divine intervention?

Highlighted for emphasis, time to come up with a new strategy.

It really depends on who you're trying to genocide. If, for example, your target race has a rival race that's been fighting it for centuries, side with them. Being an epic-level character, you'll certainly be able to give your side enough advantage to tip the balance of the war.

This wouldn't kill every member of the race, but it's a good start.

MCerberus
2007-11-12, 09:59 PM
It depends are your reading of the source of a deity's power. From what I understand, a deity's power is a direct porportional to the number of followers so if all the dwarves are gone, Moradin poofs out of existence.

Except they pop in right next to him and say "some jerk just killed us all, smite him oh mighty forgemaster!" Even if all of the souls are trapped or whatnot he's got the spirits of his loyal followers still worshiping him.

Tyrael
2007-11-12, 10:21 PM
Uh, you realize that the list is completely Spell Compendium and Players Handbook? Unless I missed something and it does actually contain other spells, then it most likely does not contain Cityscape because I have the book and have read that spell.

You sure? I'm flipping through Cityscape right now, and there's no Locate City that I can see.

Tyrael
2007-11-12, 10:24 PM
This is one of the many ways an arcane caster could do it:



Of course, this probably isn't guaranteed as there may be some terrain that will prevent your victims from flying 70 miles.

Suddenly realized something....doesn't this spell make YOU go flying, too?

Rutee
2007-11-12, 10:25 PM
You can do it at any level, if you can find a scroll of genocide. Just make sure to BUC test it with your pet first, unless you're willing to risk being surrounded. Of course, once you read it, you break the illiteracy conduct, and-- Oh, wait, you meant real D&D, not NetHack? Nevermind, then.

I loled. Also I can't beat Nethack without any conducts. I r teh failz >.>

Lord Tataraus
2007-11-12, 10:59 PM
You sure? I'm flipping through Cityscape right now, and there's no Locate City that I can see.

I could have sworn....crap. Sorry, wrong source (I should probably double check next time). I knew I read it in some city based book and yes, Races of Destiny pg167.

jameswilliamogle
2007-11-13, 08:34 AM
Convince the Harpers to import crack cocaine into their geographic location, and their rioting is a threat to national security. Let them develop their own ghettos, and start violent [race] on [race] crime. Encourage it. Start building Brandywine stores that also sell Halfling Tobacco. Also, contract-forwarding businesses that front-charge 5% of the contract's worth. Once you have them all downtrodden, start foreclosing on their homes and buildings on the grounds of a "mortgage credit meltdown". Now that they are all displaced, concentrated, and broke, use the Find City bomb.

pendell
2007-11-13, 08:53 AM
Watch out for falling catgirls!

The problem with killing creatures is that they reproduce, it's nearly impossible to get them all.

So what you're going to need is a virus.

-- it needs to be air-communicable.
-- it needs to be LD-90 (that is, 90% of those who catch it die of it, regardless of medical care) in the target species.
-- it needs to attack and subvert the immune system a la AIDS, because otherwise
creatures will simply develop immunity and within a few generations you're back to where you started. By contrast, AIDS doesn't allow for immunity .. in fact, the last prototype vaccine made people *more* susceptible to it, not less.
-- it needs to be LD-0 in any species *but* the target species. The virus needs to be able to incubate quietly in other species, because it's no good if it can only travel in the target species ... there will be no vector. Far better if you can arrange it so that everything and everyone in the world has the vector in their bloodstream to a greater or lesser extent somewhere, and it will continue to propagate ad infinitum quietly and passively. That way, the virus will continue to thrive and survive long after the initial target species is long dead. That way if a time traveler pops in or something, the virus in the food or water proves instantly lethal.

-- find some way to deny the target species access to clerics, because otherwise Cure Disease solves the problem instantly. This requires either defeating their patron god (a not-easy task, especially if the whole point of the exercise is to deny the god worshippers in the first place) or getting their god angry with them.

The second is more likely to succeed ... in fact, a better way to do it might be to encourage atheism. After all, if they lose their current god, there's no way to stop them taking another one. But if you can get them to run away from *any* god, that strips them of any possible source of cure disease.

So perhaps your insidious master plan should start with dropping them copies of 'On The Origin of Species' and 'Das Kapital' :).

Of course, it's unlikely that you'll be able to get quite *everyone* that way, as there may be pockets here and there that will remain faithful, retain access to clerics, and thus avoid the plague. So you'll need Legions of Terror to eliminate those pockets with conventional weapons. Some will escape, but if you're lucky they won't be the clerics and they will die from the plague once they get out of the protected zone.


Tongue-in-cheek,

Brian P.

Ulzgoroth
2007-11-13, 09:08 AM
I suggest a dinosaur killer. Heck, several of them. It's not like you're going to have that hard a time pushing around masses in space. (Disclaimer: requires physics that allow kinetic bombardment)

Unless burning off most of the planetary surface counts as blowing up the world?:smallwink:

AslanCross
2007-11-13, 09:31 AM
Suddenly realized something....doesn't this spell make YOU go flying, too?

Well, it locates the nearest city, with a range of 10 miles per caster level. Make sure you're far enough, I guess. If you're right on the edge of the area, you'll end up seeing people flying toward you at high speed.

Anyway, my apologies if the combo doesn't work---I was only quoting it from an older post and I can't even remember who posted it originally. (I had copied the text some time ago but stupidly forgot to quote the author)

jameswilliamogle
2007-11-13, 10:09 AM
The trick is to have nonlethal substitution added in then play a Necropolitan caster, to get around the self-damag.e

Callos_DeTerran
2007-11-13, 10:09 AM
There was a spell in the BoVD that ate an artifact and did huge ability damage to the caster to do shedloads of damage to everything within 10miles per caster level, it took 24 hours to cast though. If you're looking to wipe out a kingdom or small continent then that'd be the way to go.

Heh, unfortunately the problem with AFTS, is that it DOES do shedloads of ability damage to you (And makes it a horrendously bad idea to maxmize/empower it because the ability damage is a variable too) and it doesn't discriminate from your target species and everything else in the area. Fortunately it requires an artifact focus instead of component, the component part was a typo.

That said, I actually came up with a virus that was meant for individual species. Ethergaunts developed it as their newest weapon, it only affected a single species, did a large amount of ability damage, was immune to magic, and had a very high save (Which you needed to pass four of to overcome it naturally). It was also airborne...so yeah. Oddly enough, it was called genobolia and was primarily developed for use against humans before the virus kept mutating off side strains that affected different races.

Aquillion
2007-11-13, 12:04 PM
Except they pop in right next to him and say "some jerk just killed us all, smite him oh mighty forgemaster!" Even if all of the souls are trapped or whatnot he's got the spirits of his loyal followers still worshiping him.More importantly, you have to kill all the followers at once in an instant, or the deity will notice with their portfolio sense and come to kill you (this assumes they're not a Greater Deity, in which case their portfolio sense extends 16-20 weeks into the future, depending on their exact divine rank, and they will probably know that you are going to try and kill their followers before you do.)

Debatably, even an intermediate deity will know the instant you start to do anything even remotely aimed at killing their people, since they sense anything that touches on their portfolios 'regardless of the number of people involved'.

jameswilliamogle
2007-11-13, 12:08 PM
Heh, unfortunately the problem with AFTS, is that it DOES do shedloads of ability damage to you (And makes it a horrendously bad idea to maxmize/empower it because the ability damage is a variable too) and it doesn't discriminate from your target species and everything else in the area. Fortunately it requires an artifact focus instead of component, the component part was a typo.....Necropolitan: Immune to ability damage :smallbiggrin:

Fiery Justice
2007-11-13, 01:03 PM
What if the primary god was already dead? Just from a speculative perspective.

Hawgh
2007-11-13, 01:07 PM
I remember an Artifact from that book with crazy items in it, can't remember which one. In short, it allowed you to perform some sort of special attack on every living creature on the sunlit side of the planet you were on at the time.

You had to be a psionic to do it though.

Tor the Fallen
2007-11-13, 02:06 PM
Well, there's always the Greater Consumptive Field trick.

1. Be a Cleric.
2. Get to level 23.
3. Take Permanent Emanation (Greater Consumptive Field)
4. Go on a leisurely stroll. Anything near you with less than 9 HP instantly dies and you gain 1d8 temporary HP and an untyped +2 bonus to Strength. Rats, bugs and Commoners all drop like flies.

Furthermore, the spell is a permanent effect, so the extra hit points and strength never go away. With all the extra HP, you can make something fancy, say an Epic spell that murderizes everyone. Or just start punching people with your infinite Strength. Either way, you've broken the game.

Take persistent spell, grab a few night sticks, and hit that **** pre-epic.

mostlyharmful
2007-11-13, 02:15 PM
Heh, unfortunately the problem with AFTS, is that it DOES do shedloads of ability damage to you (And makes it a horrendously bad idea to maxmize/empower it because the ability damage is a variable too) and it doesn't discriminate from your target species and everything else in the area. Fortunately it requires an artifact focus instead of component, the component part was a typo.

hey I never said it'd be safe or pretty. And I said this was a way to wipe a kingdom or small continent not a specific race:smalltongue:

Setra
2007-11-13, 02:24 PM
Well you could just do the infinite Gate trick... that's not world nuking.

Alex12
2007-11-13, 02:25 PM
Find some way of manifesting Insanity a large number of times on a large number of people quickly. Do so in a major settlement of the target race. Teleport to another settlement, and repeat. Continue until the genetic stock is insufficient to support a population. Win.

Dalboz of Gurth
2007-11-13, 02:30 PM
Commit acts so horrifically evil that you are sucked into the demiplane of Ravenloft as a domain lord. Then you can kill everyone present without fear of dying or retribution! (unless of course someone more evil than you comes along, then you can die).

Guildorn Tanaleth
2007-11-13, 02:35 PM
Find some way of manifesting Insanity a large number of times on a large number of people quickly. Do so in a major settlement of the target race. Teleport to another settlement, and repeat. Continue until the genetic stock is insufficient to support a population. Win.

I doubt insanity would hinder reproduction, and magic-induced madness probably isn't hereditary, so all you've really done is given the next generation a valid reason to rebel against their elders. Assuming the next generation survives, that is.

Alex12
2007-11-13, 02:49 PM
I doubt insanity would hinder reproduction, and magic-induced madness probably isn't hereditary, so all you've really done is given the next generation a valid reason to rebel against their elders. Assuming the next generation survives, that is.

only 10% of the time would an insane person act normally, even if they're not being attacked. That'll make it a bit hard to set the whole reproductive process thing into motion, not to mention carry out the gestation period. I'm just guessing that since the vast majority of city-dwellers don't have class levels, they're really likely to fail their saves, and that I doubt there's enough who would make the save to be able to continue the species beyond a few generations. 50/500 rule, remember.

Catch
2007-11-13, 11:41 PM
Take persistent spell, grab a few night sticks, and hit that **** pre-epic.

That's possible, yes, but the trick is to amass a massive amount of hitpoints to burn as backlash damage for low-DC Epic spells. But having infinite strength at mid-level isn't exactly bad, either.

GoC
2007-11-15, 09:15 PM
-- it needs to attack and subvert the immune system a la AIDS, because otherwise
creatures will simply develop immunity and within a few generations you're back to where you started. By contrast, AIDS doesn't allow for immunity .. in fact, the last prototype vaccine made people *more* susceptible to it, not less.

Really?
Last I heard some prostitutes in Ethiopia or something had become immune to it.
Also it wouldn't work against the high level characters of you target race.
AND it is just as possible for their high-levels to make another harmless virus that makes all it infects look like another race to your virus.

Karu
2007-11-23, 03:02 AM
Hard to do as a player, quick and easy as a DM.
Make some deity enemy to your race create a great plague a la Resident Evil which is aimed at turning a specific race into a mass of raving, contagious zombies. Throw some more bodies into wells and public places, in every city, and you get to genocide your opponent pretty quickly.

And make the zombies weak, this way the fault of destroying them will fall upon the non-racial populations and clergy.

OneWinged4ngel
2007-11-23, 03:18 AM
Okay, supposing that you are a very cruel and evil person and you decide you want to commit genocide, but you have a charisma of three. You set out to hunt down and kill all members of a particular species (lets say, Goblins or Humans, for the sake of simplicity), you are level 20, and are unwilling to blow up the planet (no antimatter bombs nerds.), can you do it, barring divine intervention?

It depends on what level (and builds) of the people you want to commit genocide on are. And the levels of their allies. You also tell us no restrictions on the rules other than "charisma of three." So as to the question of "can you do it?"... obviously Pun Pun and similar things can do it easily. *Shrug*

Dhavaer
2007-11-23, 04:19 AM
Really?
Last I heard some prostitutes in Ethiopia or something had become immune to it.

There's a gene that codes for resistance/immunity, I think it's called Delta-32. Apparently most common in Europeans because the other thing it protects against is the black plague.

Tokiko Mima
2007-11-23, 04:20 AM
I think the most simplest solution would probably be a combination of Circle Magic and a generic (insert race) Bane spell. Increase the spells radius to the size you need (be it nation, continent, or global) and let loose. That solves the targetting issue, and kills them all at once.

But for a spell that big, you're going to need a LOTTA mage friends, and thats where that CHA would have come in handy. :smallamused: