D&D General A Trip Back In Time: On The Utter Weirdness of Old Spells

[ragweed-1]

For those who aren't familiar, Sticks to Snakes is a direct reference to the book of Exodus from the Hebrew Bible, including the reversal - when god first shows Moses how to do it, he throws down his rod and it turns into a snake, then picks up the snake and it turns back into a rod. When Moses does it for the Pharoah to show god's power, the Pharoah's magicians throw down their rods and say, yea, yea, we all know that trick.*

I would love that essay on Gygax religous background and it's roll in the evolution of DnD.

One thing to remember is that in 1970, 70% of American families belonged to a church or synogogue and more than 50% attended weekly services. Young adults developing fantasy games in the 70s, whether they themselves were believers in anything, would have as likely as not grown up getting dragged to services and would definitely be familier with the cooler miracles like rod-to-snakes, parting water, plagues of frogs, and, if Christian, feeding the multitudes, raising the dead, etc. In addition to golden-age fantasy, they would have read the Morte D'Arthur and classic retellings of Robin Hood, which are heavily imbued with Christian imagery, so its not surprising that filtered into the development of a fantasy game.

What I find really interesting is how extensively developed the devil and deamon lore is, which is also deeply rooted in Christian lore but of a much different sort.

 

[Voadam]

9. Death Spell (MU 6). This is a weird spell, mostly in the context of today. Why? Allow me to read the opening- "When a death spell is cast, it slays creatures in the area of effect instantly and irrevocably." There is no save. Seriously, you have so many spells with so many caveats, or insane restrictions, or bizarre use cases, and then there is a spell that actually does it what it is friggin' called.

There are a couple caveats on that though.

It does not affect anything with more than 8 HD. It kills lower HD creatures first and only up to a limit in total HD. Also "A death spell does not affect lycanthropes, undead creatures, or creatures from other than the Prime Material Plane."

It is also not the only 1e PH no save death spell. None of the power words including power word kill have a save, just hp limits on creatures they can affect. Similarly the death version of the symbol spell has no save, just a max total hp on creatures it can effect. These high level no save spells come in at the point where it is a lot more common for things to make their saves as saves do not get harder as the caster advances while saves get better as the target does.

 

[Zardnaar]

For those who aren't familiar, Sticks to Snakes is a direct reference to the book of Exodus from the Hebrew Bible, including the reversal - when god first shows Moses how to do it, he throws down his rod and it turns into a snake, then picks up the snake and it turns back into a rod. When Moses does it for the Pharoah to show god's power, the Pharoah's magicians throw down their rods and say, yea, yea, we all know that trick.*

I would love that essay on Gygax religous background and it's roll in the evolution of DnD.

One thing to remember is that in 1970, 70% of American families belonged to a church or synogogue and more than 50% attended weekly services. Young adults developing fantasy games in the 70s, whether they themselves were believers in anything, would have as likely as not grown up getting dragged to services and would definitely be familier with the cooler miracles like rod-to-snakes, parting water, plagues of frogs, and, if Christian, feeding the multitudes, raising the dead, etc. In addition to golden-age fantasy, they would have read the Morte D'Arthur and classic retellings of Robin Hood, which are heavily imbued with Christian imagery, so its not surprising that filtered into the development of a fantasy game.

What I find really interesting is how extensively developed the devil and deamon lore is, which is also deeply rooted in Christian lore but of a much different sort.

There were a lot of Bible coded spells in old D&D. Water walk, resurrection, sticks to snacks, create food etc.

 

[Lanefan]

I control the character sheets (homemade in Word), with a Magic & Special Items section. It includes what it does (that they know of) and where it came from (so I can look up the properties of the mysterious spear from A21 in the TOEE Air Node). It serves the same purpose as an item number.

One good thing about this approach (number or notes) is that it stops duplication of magic items (how do you both have the same spear?) that we’ve suspected in the past.

Or the flip side: it also helps stop players flat-out forgetting that their character has an item on board.

I usually list the item's properties in my own notes, to save me having to look it up at source; even more so when that "source" is my head because I was making it up on the fly.

And the notes are fun for “ah, remember when”.

Useful archives, for sure, and helpful if one wants/needs to write out a game log at some later time.

 

[Lanefan]

There are a couple caveats on though.

It does not affect anything with more than 8 HD. It kills lower HD creatures first and only up to a limit in total HD. Also "A death spell does not affect lycanthropes, undead creatures, or creatures from other than the Prime Material Plane."

In 4e terms, it's a spell whose main function is to separate the minions from the real opponents.

It is also not the only 1e PH no save death spell. None of the power words including power word kill have a save, just hp limits on creatures they can affect.

Which raised its own questions: when calculating those hit points vs the limit, do you use the target's maximum hit points or the hit points it currently has?

I always used - and still do - the target's maximum. There was an edition (was it 3e?), however, that had similar spells whose effects were based on the target's hit points, and there the ruling was to use the target's current hit points regardless of what its maximum was.

 

[GuyBoy]

There are a couple caveats on that though.

It does not affect anything with more than 8 HD. It kills lower HD creatures first and only up to a limit in total HD. Also "A death spell does not affect lycanthropes, undead creatures, or creatures from other than the Prime Material Plane."

It is also not the only 1e PH no save death spell. None of the power words including power word kill have a save, just hp limits on creatures they can affect. Similarly the death version of the symbol spell has no save, just a max total hp on creatures it can effect. These high level no save spells come in at the point where it is a lot more common for things to make their saves as saves do not get harder as the caster advances while saves get better as the target does.

Your post reminded me of several teenage debates about this spell. I understood why the Death Spell didn’t work on undead or extra-planar creatures, but never understood why lycanthropes were immune. Any ideas?

 

[Voadam]

Which raised its own questions: when calculating those hit points vs the limit, do you use the target's maximum hit points or the hit points it currently has?

I always used - and still do - the target's maximum. There was an edition (was it 3e?), however, that had similar spells whose effects were based on the target's hit points, and there the ruling was to use the target's current hit points regardless of what its maximum was.

It is explicitly the current hp in 1e.

Power Word, Stun (Conjuration/Summoning)
Level: 7 Components: V
Range: ½”/level Casting Time: 1 segment
Duration: Special Saving Throw: None
Area of Effect: One creature
Explanation/Description: When a power word, stun is uttered, any creature of
the magic-user’s choice will be stunned — reeling and unable to think
coherently or act — for 2 to 8 (2d4) melee rounds. Of course, the magic-user
must be facing the creature, and it must be within the spell caster’s range of ½”
per level of experience. Creatures with 1 to 30 hit points will be stunned for
4-16 (4d4) rounds, those with 31 to 60 hit points will be stunned for 2 to 8
(2d4) rounds, those with 61 to 90 hit points will be stunned for 1 to 4 (d4)
rounds, and creatures with over 90 hit points will not be affected. Note that if a
creature is weakened due to any cause so that its hit points are below the usual
maximum, the current number of hit points possessed will be used.

This means one should beat a powerful opponent like Lolth down a bit first if you want to use the 60 hp limit power word kill as a finisher. Of course the PCs don't know the opponent's maximum or current hp so from the caster's perspective it is always a crapshoot.

 

[Byrd]

Your post reminded me of several teenage debates about this spell. I understood why the Death Spell didn’t work on undead or extra-planar creatures, but never understood why lycanthropes were immune. Any ideas?

Wild guess: regeneration.

 

[Lanefan]

It is explicitly the current hp in 1e.

Power Word, Stun (Conjuration/Summoning)
Level: 7 Components: V
Range: ½”/level Casting Time: 1 segment
Duration: Special Saving Throw: None
Area of Effect: One creature
Explanation/Description: When a power word, stun is uttered, any creature of
the magic-user’s choice will be stunned — reeling and unable to think
coherently or act — for 2 to 8 (2d4) melee rounds. Of course, the magic-user
must be facing the creature, and it must be within the spell caster’s range of ½”
per level of experience. Creatures with 1 to 30 hit points will be stunned for
4-16 (4d4) rounds, those with 31 to 60 hit points will be stunned for 2 to 8
(2d4) rounds, those with 61 to 90 hit points will be stunned for 1 to 4 (d4)
rounds, and creatures with over 90 hit points will not be affected. Note that if a
creature is weakened due to any cause so that its hit points are below the usual
maximum, the current number of hit points possessed will be used.

This means one should beat a powerful opponent like Lolth down a bit first if you want to use the 60 hp limit power word kill as a finisher. Of course the PCs don't know the opponent's maximum or current hp so from the caster's perspective it is always a crapshoot.

Got it. Now I'm reminded, specifically by your Llolth example, of why I never liked it being that way: spells like this shouldn't be a cheap way of finishing off weakened high-powered foes, but instead a way of neutralizing lower-powered foes.

Keep in mind also that other than deities (and some really high-level Fighters), there weren't many creatures in 1e as written that had more than 90 hit points even at full. Magic resistance for the win, I suppose.

Put a save on it though, even at big minuses, and it's fine.

 

[Lanefan]

Wild guess: regeneration.

I doubt that, as Death would work fine on Trolls.

My guess: for whatever reason the designers deliberately wanted lycanthropes to be hard if not impossible to kill other than by very specific means. The Death spell isn't one of those very specific means.