Ice spells/Supernatural attacks underwater, what happens?
Empirate
First Post
Blast of ionized air?
Greenfield
Adventurer
Consider that some breath weapons are weapons, but not exactly "breath".
Cone and cloud effects would be "breath", requiring the creature to exhale. Line effects are not.
So Lightning and Acid breath attacks could be used even when the creature can't inhale/exhale, since they'r eline type effects.
Hey, it's as good a delineation as any...
Cone and cloud effects would be "breath", requiring the creature to exhale. Line effects are not.
So Lightning and Acid breath attacks could be used even when the creature can't inhale/exhale, since they'r eline type effects.
Hey, it's as good a delineation as any...
Empirate
First Post
You, mister, will go to the shame corner for an hour now, for that horrible, horrible, TERRIBLE pun!
delericho
Legend
According to the "Rules Compendium", spells and spell-like abilities aren't affected underwater, except those that require attack rolls and fire-based effects.
And, actually, my understanding is that if we apply real-world physics, it's unlikely that a large body of water like that would suddenly freeze - it really takes a lot to change the temperature of something as heavy as water.
However... given that it's magic, and given that it's likely to make for a cooler encounter, I say go for it.
And, actually, my understanding is that if we apply real-world physics, it's unlikely that a large body of water like that would suddenly freeze - it really takes a lot to change the temperature of something as heavy as water.
However... given that it's magic, and given that it's likely to make for a cooler encounter, I say go for it.
Greenfield
Adventurer
Empirate: Do you know the difference between a good pun and a bad one?
I used to think that it was a trick question, that there wasn't one, but I realized that there actually is: When I tell it, it's a good pun.
Delericho, applying real world physics to a situation where "cold" is an energy type is just asking for trouble.
I've had people argure that Fireball spells can't ignite things, can't melt ice, etc. because "instantaneous" is too fast to do that. Despite the fact that the spell says it will ignite flamable materials and can melt softer metals like lead, gold and silver.
So don't worry about whether an instantaneous effect can do what it's designed to do. It can.
As an aside, I do computer work for the cold storage warehouse industry. They have special rooms called "Blast Freezers". These are long chambers that blast sub-zero air through at high speed. They're used to quickly bring entire shipments, stacked by the pallet load, down to rock-hard frozen in a very short time. They're about as cold an area as we can make commercially feasible on that kind of scale. In total volume, though, they're not that far off of a White Dragon's 60 foot cone shaped breath.
They won't kill a man instantly. They won't do anything but "non-lethal" damage to a man in under a minute of exposure.
Now, give it 15 minutes and that man will be dead and frozen all the way through (so much more surface-to-volume than a pallet load of seafood).
What I'm saying is that a spell like Cone of Cold or the breath of a White Dragon or a Winter Wolf can and will kill a normal, healthy man almost instantly, a feat well beyond what commercial grade freezers can do, at their coldest point. So think of those spells and attacks as being more like sprays of liquid nitrogen or something similar. Not just cold air, or even Arctic-cold air, but as something that actively sucks the heat out of the target.
And yes, that *could* freeze water instantly.
I used to think that it was a trick question, that there wasn't one, but I realized that there actually is: When I tell it, it's a good pun.
Delericho, applying real world physics to a situation where "cold" is an energy type is just asking for trouble.
I've had people argure that Fireball spells can't ignite things, can't melt ice, etc. because "instantaneous" is too fast to do that. Despite the fact that the spell says it will ignite flamable materials and can melt softer metals like lead, gold and silver.
So don't worry about whether an instantaneous effect can do what it's designed to do. It can.
As an aside, I do computer work for the cold storage warehouse industry. They have special rooms called "Blast Freezers". These are long chambers that blast sub-zero air through at high speed. They're used to quickly bring entire shipments, stacked by the pallet load, down to rock-hard frozen in a very short time. They're about as cold an area as we can make commercially feasible on that kind of scale. In total volume, though, they're not that far off of a White Dragon's 60 foot cone shaped breath.
They won't kill a man instantly. They won't do anything but "non-lethal" damage to a man in under a minute of exposure.
Now, give it 15 minutes and that man will be dead and frozen all the way through (so much more surface-to-volume than a pallet load of seafood).
What I'm saying is that a spell like Cone of Cold or the breath of a White Dragon or a Winter Wolf can and will kill a normal, healthy man almost instantly, a feat well beyond what commercial grade freezers can do, at their coldest point. So think of those spells and attacks as being more like sprays of liquid nitrogen or something similar. Not just cold air, or even Arctic-cold air, but as something that actively sucks the heat out of the target.
And yes, that *could* freeze water instantly.
delericho
Legend
Sure, of course. Applying real-world science to D&D is a recipe for disaster.
It was just that I felt the OP might have been asking in a physics-y manner.
In small quantities, certainly. But in the volumes suggested by the OP? I find that rather more doubtful.
(And, actually, it can't - if it froze so quickly, the major effect of the dragon's breath would be to plug its mouth the moment the breath contacted the water.
)
