I’ve been working on an underwater adventure for my campaign. One of the characters is an Elemental Savant sorcerer focused on lightning. Naturally I began to wonder what rules existed in 3.5E D&D for electricity spells underwater.
It turns out, none. At least there are none in the SRD, and I haven’t seen any in supplements. So I set out to find a good solution.
In my opinion, any good rule should do the following:
- Add to the enjoyment of the game. If ultimately the rule does not make the game more fun at the end of the day, it is not serving a worthwhile function.
- Behave with verisimilitude. Note that this is not the same thing as behaving realistically. Many aspects of D&D are not realistic, but they do feel “right”, and that’s good enough. Falling damage doesn’t increase the heavier you get, or assume you fall at anything other than a flat rate, etc. However, this would be unfun and too complicated to model.
Players don’t really blink an eye at a magic lightning bolt defying physics in the air, but I bet anyone who goes to cast the same thing underwater experiences a cringe and expects something a little more volatile to happen. That’s what I mean by verisimilitude: it’s what you expect to happen, it has the appearance of reality, but is designed to be playable and fun.
It seemed to me there were several possibilities:
- No change. It’s magic, right? Magic makes the lightning bolt go where you want in air (which is a fickle medium for electricity), and because electricity is conducted more easily by water, it just behaves magically.
- Enhanced damage. Not my favorite, this just ups the power level and encourages a lot of lightning underwater.
- Changed discharge shape. The spell becomes a cone or a burst, as the electricty is conducted more widely by the water. Perhaps with a wider area the spell deals less damage, as the energy is dissipated in a larger space.
- Changed discharge shape, hurting the caster with the out of control electricity.
I didn’t really like any of these implementations, so I asked D&D guru Jediwiker for his opinion. He suggested the spell becomes a burst, emanating 5′ from every square it would normally pass through (including caster).
Stormwrack, the sea adventure supplement published by WotC, has rules for fire spells underwater. Fire spells are impeded the same way certain spells are in the Outer Planes (e.g. chaotic spells on strongly lawful-aligned planes). Impeded basically means the caster must overcome a certain difficulty on a Spellcraft check or lose the spell.
This option is good because it allows the player to overcome difficult situations through use of abilities. It is similar to giving a golem a high Spell Resistance, instead of spell immunity.
However, I didn’t like the idea of lightning fizzling underwater. Water doesn’t stop electricity, it just makes it behave differently. So I combined the rules with the burst-emanation idea, to get the following:
For spells with the [Electric] descriptor, the area of affect changes. The spell becomes a burst spell, emanating 5′ from every square affected by the original spell, and the spell’s damage is halved. For example, shocking grasp becomes a burst centered both on the caster and on the touched creature. Lightning bolt becomes 10′ wide swath (depending on how its aimed), affecting the caster as well. Ray attacks affect every square they pass through. |
The caster may make a Spellcraft check (DC 15 + spell level) to have the spell conform to its original shape. |
These rules shouldn’t cripple electric spells underwater (some become arguably better, such as scorching ray with electricity substituted as long as the caster has a resist or similar effect). The game should be a little more volatile, and by using a key class ability the caster can choose to fight the effect. Dc 15 + spell level should be reasonable for mid to high level games, where I’d say most underwater encounters occur.
Of course, by creating rules for one type of spell you may open a can of worms. Perhaps players demand to know what happens to [Acid] spells. Do they work normally? Hang in the water creating a “cloud” type of effect? And so forth.
So what are your experiences? In games you’ve played or run, have there been special rules for electric spells underwater? Did you find it fun or obnoxious?
January 29, 2008 at 5:43 am
Graham and I were discussing that very thing when we were talking about the Bronze Dragon being an Underwater Lightning-breathing Dragon.
Good show and welcome to the Blogshphere!!
January 29, 2008 at 8:57 am
Thanks! I haven’t even finished putting together the site’s theme and I get a comment from a big name around the community, that makes my morning.
January 29, 2008 at 9:59 am
Big name? Where? Phil looks behind him That still feels weird! :)
I’ll put you up in my next link-love post.
My trick of the trade is that you should link to other blogs and discuss your thoughts on their stuff… it brings the authors here really fast…
I actually found you when you put me up in your blogroll (which I appreciate!)
February 1, 2008 at 2:35 pm
[…] har!). He has already tackled quite a few interesting Crunch issues of D&D 3.x like using electricity magic in water and dealing with Save or Die effects. Welcome to the fold Phased, consider some of your post […]
February 1, 2008 at 3:20 pm
I run a Frostburn campaign where i wanted cold spells to be emphazised and fire spells to be impeded. I went with the following rules changes:
1) Cold spells are treated as if the caster was one level higher.
2) To actually execute/cast a fire spell a Spellcraft check must be made. The DC for this Spellcraft check is 20 + spell level. However, even a failed Spellcraft check works, its just the spell is reduced in power.
For example, lets say a sorcerer casts fireball. To successfully cast it a Spellcraft check of 23 must be made. if the caster fails this Spellcraft check by 2 or less, the caster’s level of the spell is reduced by 1. If the check fails by 3 or 4, then the CL is reduced by 2. Etc.
The positive of these rule changes was that it had the desired effect — fire spells are used rarely and then only by powerful (high spellcraft) casters. Cold spells are also much more prevalent.
The negative was the math that I had to do whenever a fire spell is cast.
February 1, 2008 at 3:21 pm
On a side note I have seen electric spells be automatically widened underwater. But that was a house/table rule.
February 1, 2008 at 3:59 pm
About your sidenote: did you enjoy the house rule (was it fun)?
About your Frostburn: I like it. I think spell impedance is a good mechanism, carrying the flavor of the archmage forcing through his will but restricting less experienced wizards.
With the heightened cold effects did you find they dominated too much in the setting?
(And an uttercold assault necromancer would have a field day with that, bwahahahaha).
February 1, 2008 at 3:59 pm
I have an icy plane sidequest planned later in the campaign, I may borrow your fire-impeded idea for that.
May 20, 2009 at 10:47 am
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January 17, 2010 at 11:49 pm
[…] har har!). He has already tackled quite a few interesting Crunch issues of D&D 3.x like using electricity magic in water and dealing with Save or Die effects. Welcome to the fold Phased, consider some of your post like […]
May 16, 2014 at 8:42 pm
Ѵery good post. I will be going throսgh some of these issues as well..