Slime Wave

[SirShandlar]

Hi all,
My question is about the spell Slime Wave from MotW. The high level Druid in my campaign uses it quite a bit (Reflex save, no SR!). I'm a little foggy on how this is supposed to work. It says that a patch of green slime does 1d6 Con damage, and a creature gets covered by one patch for every 5 feet of its face. I've been ruling that a 5x5 creature takes 1d6 damage and a 10x10 takes 2d6 damage. But what about when the creature is a 5x10? Also, in our last session they fought a 20x40 creature. How much con damage would he take?

-Ryan

 

[0-hr]

Since the area of effect is a 15ft radius spread, I would look at it as a 2-dimensional (top-down) problem. Center the spell and draw a 15ft radius circle around that. Then note the how many 5ft faces any given creature has within the circle. Every FULL exterior side results in one patch of slime applied.

Since it is a spread rather than a burst, it can turn corners to some extent, but no slime is going to travel more than 15ft from the spell center. This means that the "back face" of the victim will be coated as well if they are near the center of the burst.

If the designers actually meant for a 5x5 victim to only take one patch (rather than 4), then you should just count the number of full 5x5 squares that are within the area of effect, and apply that many patches of slime. The interpretation is up to you.

One thing to note is that the slime doesn't do any damage the instant it hits. It says that it does "1d6 of temporary Con damage per round", so a round has to go by before that first 1d6 is applied (and the slime can be scraped off by then).

I wonder how many patches you can scrape off as a standard action. I also wonder if you are suppsed to apply the slime to all of the victim's equipment as well...

 

[SirShandlar]

Kudos to your interpretation Ki Ryn. From the description I got the impression that the damage was sustained immediately, but I can see how that might not be the case. Thanks for the help.

-Ryan

 

[prodawg]

I agree that the con damage is applied during that round. Consider Melf's Acid Arrow, is damage applied in the round that it is cast?

 

[0-hr]

If something does "X damage per round", then it's going to be a round before any damage is taken. If common sense doesn't make this clear, then there is always the rule "in D&D, you always round down unless it specifically says otherwise"

Honestly though, this is a very important interpretation (especailly when you run into a flock of Stirge!), so I'd really like to hear what some of the gurus think about it.

As for Melf's, you'll note that is specifically says that it deals damage immeadiately, and then damage per round after that:

A magical arrow of acid springs from the character's hand and
speeds to its target. The character must succeed at a ranged
touch attack to hit the character's target. The arrow deals 2d4
points of acid damage. There is no splash damage. For every three
caster levels (maximum 18), the acid, unless somehow neutralized,
lasts for another round, dealing another 2d4 points of damage for
that round.

 

[Jeremy]

I don't believe that is correct. Just as Melf's does damage even on the round it is cast, and for a different example, how summoned monsters attack the same round they appear (instead of the following round), I'd have to say the slime does damage on contact just like the DMG obstruction entry for green slime says.

For one thing this is a what level spell? 7? 8? 9?

As for how to deal with number of patches per creature, as we use a battle map, in our games every 5' of it's facing would be each square it occupies. So 20x40 creatures are 4 wide and 8 long for 32 squares, though even if you centered it on the middle of the creature, it's only got a 15' spread on it, so the it's only getting 20x30 or 4 5' squares wide and 6 5' squares of it's length, so 24 squares and 24d6 possible con damage and one dead critter if it fails it's save.

Yay druids. Course a wizards finger o' death or phantasmal killer will do the same thing on a failed save, with less mess, but give the druids something.

 

[SirShandlar]

Slime Wave is level 7.
24d6 Con damage seems quite high to me. Throw in the fact that it doesn't allow SR and its a reflex save = big creature dead. If the creature has one round to scrape off some of the slime then it looks a little more reasonable to me.

-Ryan

 

[Jeremy]

It is quite high, and it is quite deadly. Head over to the damage per round thread to weigh in with your opinion.

Though I think you are going to find that just as reverse gravity and forcecage are powerful spells, so too is slime wave. It's one of the flew druids have.

 

[Junkheap]

Its also a cleric spell in defenders of the faith. Thats the first place it appeared. BUT how much of the slime can the creature remove in 1 round?

 

[Gromm]

I don't believe that is correct. Just as Melf's does damage even on the round it is cast, and for a different example, how summoned monsters attack the same round they appear (instead of the following round), I'd have to say the slime does damage on contact just like the DMG obstruction entry for green slime says.

DMG p117

"A single patch of green slime deals 1d6 points of temporary Con damag per round while it devours flesh. On the first round of contact, the slime can be scraped off a creature, (most likely destroying the scraping device), but after that it must be frozen..."

So his interpretation matches the DMG exactly (and makes the spell sane).

As far as the acid arrow and summon, both spells say in thier descriptions that they take effect immediately: Summoned monsters "attack immediately on your turn" and acid arrow "deals 2d4 points of acid damage" and then goes on to describe the effects of later rounds.