But what happens if you pass your Dispel Check? The book bomb is defused and just becomes 100 pages and 100 spell slots worth of wasted effort?Hicks wrote:Level 5
Book Bomb: I learned this trick over a decade ago on the Wizards forums. Explosive Runes is the abjuration spell that just blows everything away, but only if properly prepared. So the thing is you just buy a 50gp book with a hundred pages in it, and at the end of every day cast Explosive Runes with any unused spell slots you have on each page until the book is filled. and then store that thing in a haversack or some other extradimensional space because it will kill you. at level 5 (and after casting Explosive Runes into the book a hundred times) you hand the haversack with the book bomb to somebody you absolutely trust, and when something absolutely needs to die, you ready an action to cast Dispel Magic on the book after your trusted friend uses a move action to retrieve the book bomb from the haversack and uses their standard action to throw the book bomb at the square the soon to be destroyed creature stands. the square has an AC 5, and they can throw the book bomb up to 50 feet. THEN, and this is crutial, you fail your dispel check. Any thing within 10 feet of the (not) dispelled book bomb has to make reflex save (for half) or take 6d6 force damage, and SR applies, and they have to do that 100 times. Average damage is ~2,100 damage, but that is with no successful saves so it goes down to 1,995 if they only save on a 20, and minimum average damage is ~105 if they only fail on a 1. Spell Resistance makes the calculation weird, but basically if at level 5 you went up against something with SR 15, it would half the expected damage output, Maxing out at ~937.7 and bottoming out at ~52.5 damage, depending on reflex saves. it works against everything except golems, but those can be beaten with Silent Image so who cares? This dumb combo does the "most" raw HP damage up to level 11.
As amusing as this is, I honestly cannot think any sane DM, even a really fun, really open minded one in a really crazy, over the top game, would let you get away with these (VERY SPECIFIC) shenanigans (don't get me wrong, book bomb and giant cantrip bolt are great). For starters, without even getting into any other element of this... I just have a very hard time accepting the classification of an entire PLANE as an Object. Like essentially, I would have to say show me where it says in the RAW that a PLANE is an Object, because going on common sense alone, the sane assumption is that it isn't. Objects have certain defining traits...being breakable, being FINITE, not being the home to millions of sapient beings...that planes very manifestly DO NOT HAVE.Level 11
IPAD: so no joke, this came about because i was researching rules legal ways for airships to exist in 3.5, and it all starts with buying some chickens. These are crutial, 'cuz we really are about to do an actual blood sacrifice (in 3.5) to end the universe (in 3.5). You need lat least 12 chickens, or any 1 HD creature with less than 10 HP, and you should probably be on any plane in the abyss, but really any infinite outer plane will do. so you get your pen of 12 chickens near an efreet you used planer binding on in the Abyss to get 3 wishes, and the first wish is for the genie to cast Greater Consumptive Field, which will kill the chickens and add +12 to the efreet's caster level (which is now at least CL 32). the second wish is to have the efreet cast Animate Objects on the abyssal plane you're on, and due to how dumb the size rules in 3.5 are anything, and i quote, "64 ft. or more" counts as a colossal object, and an infinite abyssal plane is by definition "64 ft. or more" in every dimension, it now counts as an animated object creature. And finally for the third Wish, you wish for the efreet to, "Transport travelers. A wish can lift one creature per caster level from anywhere on any plane and place those creatures anywhere else on any plane regardless of local conditions." and drop that colossal animated abyssal plane at least 10 feet anywhere in the multiverse that you just want to not exist anymore.
"For each 200 pounds of an object’s weight, the object deals 1d6 points of damage, provided it falls at least 10 feet."
So Infinity divided by 200 is InfinityD6 damage, which basically obliterates everything in the target plane for no save, no SR, just raw the damage.
There are of course still counters to this. A properly worded contingent Plane Shift could (with a successful concentration check to defensively cast in a threatened area, touch attack, and failed will save) send the plane to a predesignated plane, obliterating someplace else; and a contingent Wish could also do that (the concentration check to defensively cast it is a little higher, but has a higher save and doesn't require an attack roll) and can even return the Inter Planar Abyss Drop to sender, and then have it bounce back and forth until someone runs out of contingencies or fails a concentration check. And of course Frenzied Berserkers will be in their deathless frenzy, frantically trying to huff their waterskins to drown away the infinite damage they just took, but those peeps were immune to HP damage anyway.
The nice thing about an IPAD is that it is weirdly scaleable. don't want to obliterate an entire plane of existance? just animate a planet or moon, asteroid, or you could even use stone shape to custom carve out a city shaped divot (seperating the divot from the moon or whatever by 1 picometer) to selectivly obliterate the offending part of the campaign world you just can't stand.
And of course in Pathfinder it still works (colossal creatures are still, "64 ft. or more") and it's as easy as handing your planar bound efreet 5 strands of Prayer Beads, each of which only contain a single Bead of Karma to boost its CL from 15 to 35, and only takes 2 wishes. I mean it still takes a 100,000gp in prayer beads, but think of all the gold you'll save on chicken sacrifices!
Anyway now I want to cast Animate Object on a gargantuan crossbow bolt. It's not efficient or powerful at all, it just amuses me.