How to move a library using magic?

[Melcar]

So, the other day I had a question about Cormyr - Tearing of the Weave...

I have another one now, that you guys might help me with. Assuming you have access to 9th level spells, how would you transport the Library in R12? Its 1874 books, weighting in at 3 lbs per book, taking up about 1500 cubic feet.

The obvious would be to use something like Wish, but by RAW, I can't see how that would work, because its ability to transport "things" seems fairly specific to creatures... Miracle mentions gear (which I assume the Wish version would include too), but 5 large book shelves can hardly be called gear.

Any DM, could obviously just hand-wave that either wish or miracle would be more than enough to handle such a mundane task of moving books from A to B, but I would like to explore more RAW options before reverting to that...

I ask, because the module tells that if somehow all the books are brought from the plane its worth 20k... Before running this for my friends, I would like to hear what options you guys would suggest in dealing with people wanting to keep the books...

Any suggestions would be welcome...

Thanks!

[Mechalich]

I have another one now, that you guys might help me with. Assuming you have access to 9th level spells, how would you transport the Library in R12? Its 1874 books, weighting in at 3 lbs per book, taking up about 1500 cubic feet.

That calculation is...strange.

Loose hardback books (https://www.epa.gov/sites/default/files/2016-03/documents/conversions.pdf) weigh ~20 lbs. per cubic foot. Likewise, if 1874 books occupy 1500 cubic ft of space each book is 0.8 cubic feet in size, which is very large for a book. For comparison the CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics (a 1600 pg reference manual that weighs in at nearly 8 lbs and is one of the largest books commonly encountered in the modern day), occupies a mere 0.15 cubic feet of space. While pre-industrial tomes are somewhat less dense than modern texts, it's not by that much.

If we used the modern numbers your 1874 books would weigh 5622 lbs and take up a mere 281 cubic feet of space. That's overly generous, pre-modern books incur larger amounts of size variation and would be lower density, and 3 lbs apiece actually seems like for magical tomes, but even if you up the average mass to 5 lbs. and say only 15 lbs per cubic foot you're still at only 625 cubic feet (though your books do weigh almost 10000 lbs).

You could just haul the books out physically, assuming you can rig them for carrying. 10000 lbs is well within the means of a suitably large being to carry. For example, a Titan is a Huge creature with 43 strength. So a heavy load for it extends up to 1400x4x4 = 22400 lbs. You can shapechange into one (or various other options, like large dinosaurs) and then haul the books off. Admittedly you'll probably have to dismantle their bookshelves and some other furniture to put together a suitably big set of boxes to strap on.

[Maat Mons]

You could use the planar travel function of Gate. Just wheel them through in carts.

Arguably, casting Shrink Item on a container shrinks both it and its contents.

If a character is strong enough to lift the shelf, books and all, they can be teleported while holding it.

You could dump them all into an Enveloping Pit, and carry that out.

[Jervis]

You could use the planar travel function of Gate. Just wheel them through in carts.

Arguably, casting Shrink Item on a container shrinks both it and its contents.

If a character is strong enough to lift the shelf, books and all, they can be teleported while holding it.

You could dump them all into an Enveloping Pit, and carry that out.

Yeah a couple enveloping pits are probably your best bet. They’re cheap enough that you can definitely make a profit this way.

[TheStranger]

So, the other day I had a question about Cormyr - Tearing of the Weave...

I have another one now, that you guys might help me with. Assuming you have access to 9th level spells, how would you transport the Library in R12? Its 1874 books, weighting in at 3 lbs per book, taking up about 1500 cubic feet.

The obvious would be to use something like Wish, but by RAW, I can't see how that would work, because its ability to transport "things" seems fairly specific to creatures... Miracle mentions gear (which I assume the Wish version would include too), but 5 large book shelves can hardly be called gear.

Any DM, could obviously just hand-wave that either wish or miracle would be more than enough to handle such a mundane task of moving books from A to B, but I would like to explore more RAW options before reverting to that...

I ask, because the module tells that if somehow all the books are brought from the plane its worth 20k... Before running this for my friends, I would like to hear what options you guys would suggest in dealing with people wanting to keep the books...

Any suggestions would be welcome...

Thanks!


I'm not familiar with the module in question, but in general carrying loot is a trivial problem if you have some time and resources to devote to it. Since you said you need planar travel, the easiest way is probably to just load all the books into a wagon, cast gate, and go where you want to go. If you don't have a wagon, fabricate one using the bookshelves as raw material or teleport/gate to the nearest city and hire one and a few workers to load it for you. Or, if you prefer, a wizard polymorphed into something suitably beefy (or a summoned creature, or the party barbarian) could probably just carry a box holding all the books. 1500 cubic feet (as noted, this is way more than it should be, but I'll roll with it for now) is a crate about 12 feet on a side, which is awkward but not completely impossible for a large/huge creature to lift and walk a few steps with. Or use a bag of holding and make a few trips. There are enough solutions that if a high level party says they're willing to take an afternoon to move books you could just handwave it, and the only thing you really need high level spells for is the planar travel.

[Arcanist]

A casting of Servant Horde to funnel them into two Bag of Holding VI. I then use a Gate spell and have the Servants drag the contents back to my dwelling on whatever plane I might call home. The Bookshelves are a separate problem entirely. I'd cast Dispel Magic on them to get them to be treated as non-magical items and then cast Chain Shrink Item on the two of them and place them in my pocket and return home via whatever means are most efficient for me.

[Seward]

Get a sorcerer with Tenser's disk. Cast a lot of disks. A few thousand pounds of books is no big deal. If volume is a problem, stack them on a large pallet/platform/something that is more than 3' off the ground, cast the disks, and knock out the supports for the platform so the structure is carried on the disks.

My sorceress moved an entire infantry company across a swamp that that way once. It was hard on her spell slots but they were really needed....

Fabricate+tenser's disk makes this trick easier. You are limited to light warhorse speed overland barring an unusually large base land speed (disks keep up with your land speed hustle, which is same speed overland as a light warhorse that doesn't hustle. My gal was using a phantom steed but I had to go slow.)

She more commonly used this trick to move wagons over any terrain, she'd levitate the wagon up, cast two disks front and back (the wagons were designed to carry weight either on the axle or on two rounded posts that exactly fit the disk dimensions), drop it down on the disks, then ride a mundane light warhorse. But it can scale. Somebody with actual crafting skill is probably needed to make a structure that can hold a whole library and be supported from the bottom, but most PC parties can find such expertise if they don't have it themselves.

[Bohandas]

Do they have to all go at once? Because if not you could use Gate or Teleportation Circle

[Analytica]

Put it on a boat and use the Planar Navigation spell to shift it to a watery plane, then back to a Faerun ocean.

[Melcar]

Yeah a couple enveloping pits are probably your best bet. They’re cheap enough that you can definitely make a profit this way.

I think this might just be the easiest mode of transportation for something that takes up that amount of weight and space... and also the cheapest - which I find odd. Its much larger than a portable hole, yet costs a fraction... why is that? What am I missing here?

Also, could I carry my enveloping pit inside my belt of many pockets? I know portable holes and bags of holdings are no good, but are belts of many pockets so similar that it would create the same effects?

Thanks!

[Feantar]

Also, could I carry my enveloping pit inside my belt of many pockets? I know portable holes and bags of holdings are no good, but are belts of many pockets so similar that it would create the same effects?

Don't, just, don't man. Don't stack extradimensional spaces, nothing good ever came of it. Since the belt specifies it is "Similar to a bag of holding" and since the enveloping pit "functions like a portable hole", if you put the pit in the belt, then a portal to the astral would open and everyone within 10 ft would be pulled within - and more importantly, they are both destroyed.

[Seward]

My Tenser Disk sorceress would have been less expensive than any magic item to move your library. She'd probably do it just to be allowed to read some of the books, if you asked the right way. Especially if you were likely to be attacked on the way and she could make her coin in "adventurer tax" on anybody stupid enough to try to take it away.

But you work with what you have. And I do admit that storing in an extradimensional space and then teleporting it protects it better from damage than crating it up and moving it overland (or oversea) at light warhorse speeds.

Here's another idea though. Shrink Item, preferably backed with Chain Spell, with a 14k lesser rod if the caster lacks the metamagic (or slots) to do it. I'm not sure it scales as well and it was never clear if you could shrink item a container, like a chest. If you can, build a bunch of 2 cu/ft/lvl shipping containers, pack the books in it, cast chain shrink item (and shrink item with lower level spell slots). That might make it possible to transport without even needing X-d storage via teleport. The main issue is volume. You'd need several casters or one decent level one. Doing it out of your head needs about 5 slots of chain spell and a few castings of normal, a bit less if you have caster level enhancers. But basically a L12 sorcerer with the spell and feat (using all top level spells, plus 15 castings of the spell using L3-5 slots) or a L12 focused specialist transmuter/L13 wizard.

With a rod of chain spell you only need a L9 wizard and 6 castings of the spell (3 with rod, 3 without)

Even if you assume you are hiring a NPC for this, a L9 wizard isn't out of the question to hire, and you want teleport anyway.
Find a wizard who provides teleport services, that'll save you a little money. Then offer him a new spell and an unusual job.

So total cost would be:

Scroll of Shrink Item (to scribe into their spellbook) 375
Scribing costs 300gp
6 castings of shrink item 1620gp
3 castings of teleport (wizard home to library, to destination,reimburse wizard for trip back to wizard's home) 1350gp
Lesser Rod of Chain Spell 14000gp (can be sold back for 7000gp if you don't want to keep it).

Total cost 3645 in service costs, 14k (or 7k) depending on if you want to keep the rod.

I'm not sure how that compares to the pit idea or other XD sources, but shrink item is very efficient.

It reduces weight by 1/4000, and can turn all those boxes into little bits of cloth. A 1sp sack would hold them all and you'd barely notice it in your weight limit for teleporting. You can even arrange the boxes conveniently around your destination library for unpacking without wasting the wizard's time, since anybody can toss the shrunk item to the ground and it will regain full size. If any of those books ARE magical, you'll need to bring them separately.

This can pretty much be reduced to scroll and rod cost if you have a wizard buddy willing to do you a favor in exchange for a new spell in his spellbook+past relationship.

All of this assumes you are on the same plane. I assumed given your access to L9 spells you could handle the plane shift duties yourself, and that might save you on teleport costs depending on your exact situation and the precision off your plane shift capability. Shrink item is specialized enough as is chain spell I assumed you had no easy way to simulate that (you can't just use a lesser rod with limited wish-shrink item, for example)

[Jervis]

I think this might just be the easiest mode of transportation for something that takes up that amount of weight and space... and also the cheapest - which I find odd. Its much larger than a portable hole, yet costs a fraction... why is that? What am I missing here?

Also, could I carry my enveloping pit inside my belt of many pockets? I know portable holes and bags of holdings are no good, but are belts of many pockets so similar that it would create the same effects?

Thanks!

I mean, you can. It’ll end very badly but you can try. Number one rule of extra dimensional storage, keep them FAAAAR away from each other

[Maat Mons]

As a bit of an aside, Dragon magazine printed an item called Dragonskin Bag of Grendel that's basically a Bag of Holding, except that things you put inside of it are shrunk instead of in a extradimensional space. Maybe handy for nesting storage containers without mishap.

[AssociateGreen]

Assuming the archmage is suitably unconcerned with XP costs (and assuming their CL 20th), they could wish for animate object on the bookcases and permanency to not have to sweat the duration. Since unlike teleport, plane shift doesnt have a weight limit on equipment creatures carry, the mage can then greater plane shift his new, mahogany pack animals accurately to either his abode on Faerun or the offices of a reputable bookseller they are familiar with.

Three spells (5th, 8th, 9th), and has the added benefit of being stylish without having to fiddle with a bunch of magic bags/chests or handling the books themselves right away.

Edit: Though, come to think of it, a cleric could do it for no XP cost thanks to miracle's caveat about XP and duplicating spells. Just cast animate object and miracle for permanency instead. Truly, CoDzilla will always reign supreme. :smallcool:

[Smoutwortel]

Teleportation circle
Tenser's floating disk
Passwall

[unseenmage]

Fabricate + Animate Objects to make any room you want to move a creature.

Then Gate, Greater Plane Shift, and/or Greater Teleport does the trick.

If you have the cash a pair of Planar Ring Gates from Planar Handbook solves a lot of travel problems esp when used with spells or abilities that redirect planar portals.