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Message: <blockquote data-quote="comrade raoul" data-source="post: 3795609" data-attributes="member: 554">Cool! So the idea is to have a not-bad direct damage spell (weaker than polar ray, but not subject to energy resistance) with a debilitating extra effect on a saving throw. So the "grevious cutting wound" bit is critical to balancing the spell--if we neglected it, the spell would totally be underpowered. However, while this component is really neat and flavorful, it also seems like it creates more problems than it raises. Here are some questions I had.-- Who decides what body part gets removed? The caster or the DM? Should it be random? What if the body part in question makes the big difference? (Suppose one hand is holding a weapon, for example.)-- What effects does it have on creatures with unusual body parts? Should the DM just resolve those issues on the fly?-- Is there any way creatures can recover lost body parts?I guess the range of possibilities makes S^3 a potentially dangerous but unpredictable spell. To be honest, though, I'm more comfortable with a switch that compromises much of the flavor of the spell but makes it a bit more managable: suppose you instead captured the grevious wound with Constitution damage? For example, you might say that a successful hit deals 10d6 points of damage, plus 2d6 points of Constitution damage, and allow a successful Fortitude save to halve the Constitution damage (but not the regular damage). (You might still say that creatures killed by the spell are decapitated.)</blockquote>

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