The "Disintegrate" spell.. or "Obliviate"

Obliviate from wraith... Disintegrate from D&D and a million other games... how can you replicate that all-time favourite (at least for me) effect of having your target being hit by what looks like to be a nuke?

Any ideas? The only Idea I have is kill them with something then add PeCo to disintegrate the corpse? But wouldn't that add magnitudes to difficulty?

What about PeCo 40 for the voice-ranged heart stop with an added Corpse Disintegration? What are the guidelines for combining a PeCo 30 effect with, lets say a PeC0 5 affect? Would the "Slay a person" spell with voice range PeCo 40 require a boost to "disintegrate a corpse" or would that be free?

Thanks

Why not a high magnitude CrIg effect? That seems pretty nuclear to me. If the fire/heat is sufficiently hot it shouldn't leave a corpse behind.

Consider the MuIm "Scattering the Light" spell currently under discussion in another thread. Replace Te with Co and boom, its a disintegrate spell.

"Total Protonic Reversal"......

Last flight of the phoenix + earthquake by the side of a cliff tends to simulate a nuke good enough. The ghosts of the inhabitants of Toledo would tell you that.

Xavi

So what would be the total spell level?

Actually I just noticed that the problem with muto spells is the duration. Yes I can turn someone into light using MuCo(Ig)

So that would be Base 30 +2 voice, +1 requisite, +1 duration Diam Total level 50?

That's a little bit too nuts? Can anyone address my earlier question? Cause a Fatal wound with PeCo30 then disintegrate body with PeCo5? I'm not sure what are the rules on combining multiple affects from the same art+technique? Would that be a total PeCo30 or a PeCo35?

Sam W.

IMO, you need two different spells to use 2 guidelines from the same art (it's not a requisite).

I agree that it's not a requisite. However, there are complexity increases to spell magnitudes, too. I would think it would typically be handled that way.

Chris

Well in fact, after rethinking, PeCo base 30 (kill) +5 (disintegrate) would be ok for me.

Now, would that be a considered a 'similar spell' to Clenching Grasp for the Crushed Heart?

Also, are there any examples of Corpus spells doing +X damage rather than causing wounds straight up?

Death effect or death + sympa effect stay, IMO, death effect, principally

Interesting, the guideline for similar effect is "same effect as per game rules" (yes, paraphrasing) (Hence Perdo Ignem fatigue drain would be the same as Perdo Corpus fatigue drain even though one is chilld, and one is exhausted...).

So this comes down to whether disintegrate as Fatal Wound + Destroy corpse is the "same effect as per game rules" ... considering disintegrating a corpse, is a separate effect as per game rules (PeCo 5)

Also, that would then beg the question, being castrated and being blinded? They are both a "heavy wound" lets say, or medium, or any other two completely different bodily effects that translate into the same "wound type" - yet they have significantly different side effects vs a -3 or a -5.

While "doubling over a dying" could be the same as "bleeding from your ears and dying"... I'm not sure I'd be so quick to say "disintegrating into dust" would be the same as "aneurysm, stroke, broken neck, etc.." - regardless of the fact that they're all "fatal" wounds.

Otherwise, we'd then have to also start looking at "+3 to defence" spells for example, regardless of how you get that +3 (moving quicker, illusion, choking dust cloud around you that you're immune to) all being "similar".

Maybe it'll just be SG/troupe prerogative?

Sam W.

No free lunch. (or, very rarely, at least.)

Destroying a corpse is a nifty effect and "dead is dead", but otoh it's also a nice bonus and a very real addition to the spell, so your troupe could either rule that it's merely cosmetic or that it requires additional magnitudes (and I think most canon examples support the latter). I'd rule at least +1 magnitude, maybe +2, and the target must die, certainly, or the second effect is completely ignored.

Depending on how your troupe views it, you might also get some interesting effects with high level Rego Corpus, tearing a (dead) body apart, but Perdo would be the most cost-efficient.

Many examples contradict this.

For instance, with most Terram spells, to affect both metal and stone, an effect requires the higher Base plus another magnitude for the added effect. Similar with CrIg spells that create both light and heat - just +1 magnitude. Or Mentem spells where more than one emotion is affected.

There are examples where you can't stack effects - Intellego spells with Target:X Sense cannot be stacked - the target is either Vision or Hearing or etc. And there are a few others. But as a rule, adding a second effect of the same Te/Fo is just +1 magnitude.

'Black Globe of Oblivion'
Perdo Everything :slight_smile:
Base Level 40 (Perdo Corpus guideline for destroying one property of a person - usually affecting one part is harder than affecting all of a person, but it is harder than just killing someone, in my opinion)
+1 magnitude per form (14 more forms).

Then you need more range, larger target, higher duration (!) and a rego requisite to be able to suppress it...

So, the full spell is Range Sight (+3), Target Structure (+3), Duration Moon (+3), Rego +1 or 160th level, and has to be a ritual in 5th ed (hence the rego req and the moon duration, so you can unsuppress it whenever you wish onto whatever is annoying you).

Obviously, you'd want high penetration so you'd use as many multipliers as you can when you cast it somewhere quiet and peaceful ready to unleash it when you're ready...

A long-winded way of saying, yes you need an extra magnitude to disintegrate a body than just to kill it - in my opinion.
Gilarius.
PS I've used this to disintegrate the Tower of London and a nasty demon (MM500+, I think) plus lots of nasty followers - and a few incidental innocents which gave my magus an infernal taint...this was a very high-powered 4th ed game.

+9 more forms, like you said.

I doubt if most such spells would care to destroy the image, or light/heat, or magic, or weather effects, or water, or the mind, once the rest is gone. And most Herbem/Terram targets are going to be inanimate. Beyond Corpus/Animal, the rest is fairly specialized.

Most likely a half dozen formulaic spells rather than one absurdly and pointlessly large ritual spell. :wink:

No, no ,no! The whole point was to make the most stupidly grandiose spell I could! I miss-counted the forms (adding in the Techniques too) - that'll teach me to not bother to check the number.
It actually ended up higher level than that, because I also made it shapable with another Rego req, so I could hide in the middle - unfortunately I was unable to see out so couldn't tell whether it was safe to suppress it. It was that magus' only offensive combat spell. No, I don't tend to play sensible characters.

Gilarius

Since it is more than a cosmetic effect (no body left, can't raise the dead for example), we've agreed that the fairest is a +1 magnitude.

The spell was then bumped up by another +1 magnitude to increase range to sight, allowing for a rather nasty "dusting" or "disintegration" of the target at long range, but with probably very very low penetration.

Unless you're a PeCo master with a Focus of like.. "precise (single target) destruction" or something.

Sam W.

If you want even more magnitudes, make it a PeTe spell and add magnitudes for stone, metal, precious gems et al. That would be an additional +3 mags, IIRC.

Cheers,
Xavi

But then itd have to be a ritual :frowning:

Stupid dyslexia, I was trying to figure out what the common thread was between "disintegrate" and "bloviate." :slight_smile:

I suppose a Bloviate spell could still count as "most stupidly grandiose" though!